


The Goblet

by mrsdaphnefielding



Category: Warehouse 13
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medieval, Alternate Universe - Warehouse 13, F/F, Gottfried von Straßburg
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-13
Updated: 2014-07-15
Packaged: 2018-01-24 01:47:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1587119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mrsdaphnefielding/pseuds/mrsdaphnefielding
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"But what if Myka were the knight for a change?"<br/>Medieval AU. Bering & Wells meets Tristan & Iseult.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> “But what if Myka were the knight for a change?”  
> After writing a medieval AU where Helena was a knight (and Myka a nun), I began to wonder how the dynamic would change in Myka were the knight. I couldn’t fully picture Helena as a nun. Then again, I could picture her perfectly as a vengeful princess. And that’s when this idea barreled headlong into Tristan & Iseult. There are many versions of that myth; modern Western perception tends to be shaped by Celtic legend, medieval French court literature, and the 19th century opera by Richard Wagner. For this story, I’ve drawn primarily from the most popular version, Gottfried von Strassburg’s “Tristan” fragment (written around 1210) and from the 1865 opera. All chapter quotes are from Gottfried, which is available in full online (http://www.hs-augsburg.de/~harsch/germanica/Chronologie/13Jh/Gottfried/got_tr00.html). Translations cited after Lee Stavenhagen, who hosts a full English translation online: http://stavenhagen.net/GvS/Tris.html  
> There are various full productions of the opera on YouTube, fully subbed. If you’ve got 4 hours to kill, you could try the 2007 Scala production by Patrice Chereau (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7S-_R8RQr8E). I know there’s also a recent movie, which I haven’t watched.  
> Finally, I know history didn’t quite give us the female knights it should have, but given that it's a stupid-ass happenstance, I've elected to ignore it.

1

 

_nu begunde ir herze kalten_  
 _umbe ir schaden den alten._  
 _ir varwe diu wart beide_  
 _von zorne und von leide_  
 _tôtbleich und iesâ viuwerrôt._

(Gottfried von Straßburg, _Tristan_ , v. 10087-10091)

 

The sea is rolling, forever the sea. She can feel it tear at her blood.

It beckons her where she is standing, nose pressed to the very bow of the ship. The salty humidity is ever present, a fine sheen on the planks even down here, in the dark belly.

It is a luxurious cabin, she has to admit. There are tapestries and soft carpets and even a pair of delicate chairs. She wants to scoff at them because this is a vassal’s ship, but she cannot find anything at fault.

Still, she stands at the bow in the dim light, hands pressed against the wood where she can feel the sea push against her palms. The roar sweeps through her like the ire in her veins. Up and down, up and down, but she doesn't feel nausea. She only feels rage.

Across the room, a shadow is huddled against the foot of the bed and if there was more light, she would see the fear and the nausea that she doesn't allow herself etched into the worried face of Claudia of Braen. What possessed her mother – the Queen – to send such a young companion along, she will never know. But Claudia stands doggedly by her side, and Claudia does not complain.

When the seamen hurl insults at them, Claudia does not back down. She glares back defiantly, despite her youth and her slight stature and her temper and all the things which a companion should not be. Not on such a journey.

In the old times, this would not have happened. She would not have stood on the ship of a vassal’s vassal, carted off like cattle to be married beneath her standing. But the old blood is weakening. She can feel it. A few generations back, Queen Irene would have laughed her suitor out of the court, or would have changed at the insult and torn after them.

Changing has turned into legend along with the old Gods, and she stands deep in the bow of a ship carrying her away from the green and the salt that mean home.

“Princess…”

She whirls around, and Claudia takes a step back at the anger in her stance, but she doesn’t relent.

“Helena–”

And Helena presses her forehead against the wood and wills the sea to answer her call and swallow them all, her rage, the men and every last plank.

“You need to rest.” Claudia insists. “You need to eat.”

But none of this is about what Helena needs.

“At least get some air.”

They would let her on deck. She is their future queen, no matter the murmurs among the seamen. And wouldn’t they love to parade her up there, the prize won for their king, bared to all eyes as the coast of Cornwall draws near.

She will not do them the favor. If they want her on deck, they will have to carry her up against her will, just as she was pushed into this betrothal. She will not let them forget that.

“So that they may hand me to Arthur with rosy cheeks?” Claudia doesn’t deserve her ire, but ire is all that Helena has left. “They will have to drag me up by my hair.”

“He is king,” Claudia reminds her, having caught on to Helena omitting his title, not for the first time. It is the last bit of defiance she allows herself.

“The most powerful king there is at the moment, and past the point of youthful idiocies,” Claudia continues. She is of noble birth, but not royal blood, and has learned early to arrange herself with decisions made by others. “There could not be a worthier husband.”

But Helena is the Queen’s daughter. “He is a vassal.”

“Not anymore.” Claudia states practically. She hesitates, but only for the merest bit. “Is this truly about King Arthur?”

Claudia is far too astute for her age.

“Is it not enough that they are mocking our line and land?” Helena spits out. “Not enough that they have slain my betrothed, that I was bartered away to them?” She stands tall. “They will have to drag me up by my hair.”

For a moment, there is quiet, but Claudia is far more valiant than Helena expected. “You know she would never do that.”

Yes, they both know that. They know it only too well, and part of Helena even wishes –-- and that is a thought she quenches right there.

“She is too much of a coward even for that,” she declares with derision instead.

“A coward? Lady Myka?” Claudia sounds as if she wants to protest on behalf of their adversary.

“How would you know?” Helena asks archly. “How? During this entire journey, she hasn’t presented herself once!” She crosses her arms over her chest, the fall of embroidered sleeves echoing her gesture. “She hasn’t even looked at me since she obtained me for her King.”

Helena doesn’t begrudge Queen Irene for giving her away in a peace treaty. Eire cannot afford to battle both the Normans and the Cornish at once, and marriage is a common settlement.

But not to this King. And not through this envoy.

“Imagine what a King he has to be, if he has such knights at his service! Lady Myka is the most important one in all of Cornwall.” Claudia is clearly taken with their host and Helena wishes she didn’t know how easy that is. “As a woman knight! There are so few on all the islands ---”

Oh, there is no shortage of stories about King Arthur’s gallant niece, not on all the islands. And Helena doesn’t want to hear them, least of all the one where Lady Myka of Canoêl persuaded her uncle to stop paying toll. Where she headed a party to break the old contract on Irish soil. Where, in battle, she killed the Sir Nathaniel, the pride of Eire, only to return to claim his bereft bride as a prize for her vassal uncle. What a fine story that makes.

This one in particular, she had heard more than enough. Petrus Curvenal tells it on deck, time and again, to the roaring laughter of the seamen. He makes sure to tell it loud enough to carry down here.

It isn’t Curvenal who is keeping her under deck, though. The insults, she can handle. Whatever Petrus Curvenal throws at her, she will scoff at.

But going up would also mean seeing _her_.

~***~

Up on deck, wrapped in a woolen coat, a lone figure is standing in the shadow of the helm, head tipped back to gaze at the fading stars. The journey is almost over, the waves pushing them homeward now. And she has done the impossible, forged peace with Eire and even won their proud princess as bride for the King.

Myka of Canoêl closes her eyes for a moment and wonders why she doesn’t feel more at peace. She tastes salt on her lips, her palm closing around the worn hilt of her sword.

The sea is rolling, forever the sea. She can feel it tear at her blood.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> quote translation:  
> The cold fist of an old insult  
> seized her heart in its grasp.  
> Her color both blazed and paled  
> with fury and with anguish,  
> first deathly pale, then fire-red.


	2. Chapter 2

2

_si kâmen mit gelîcher ger_  
 _gelîche vliegende her,_  
 _daz sî diu sper zestâchen,_  
 _daz s'in den schilten brâchen_  
 _wol ze tûsent stucken._

(Gottfried von Straßburg, _Tristan_ , v. 6857-6861)

 

 

On the horizon, there is a thin line of green that will never mean home again.

It is Claudia who tells her about it. Helena merely feels the shift in the rhythm of the waves. The shore is drawing closer, and this is why she sends up Claudia to get Lady Myka, in a sudden flash of urgency. They will be landing soon, and she needs to end this. And if this is the end, she needs to talk to her once more, to try and understand ---

But there is Petrus Curvenal, blocking the path before Claudia can even make it to the helm.

One more reason to end this.

The carpets seem to swallow up her anger as she paces, Claudia’s slumped shoulders at the corner of her vision. Rage is tingling in every fingertip of her clenched fists.

How dare he. How dare _she_.

“I tried to…” Claudia wants to explain.

“It is alright,” Helena says, even though nothing is.

“What’s so urgent?” A damp breeze and bright light invade their space, and Helena can make out the silhouette of Petrus Curvenal leaning against the entrance. “…Princess,” he tacks on, late enough to have it be an insult rather than her rightful title.

Helena stands tall. “Get your liege.” She won’t say her name, and how dare she hide behind her second-in-command.

Curvenal shrugs, his pose defying her standing. “She doesn’t have time.” He is Lady Myka’s eyes and ears, her chosen swordsman. His frame carries an edge of menace, bulky enough to remind them that his calling is that of a warrior, not that of a courtier in brocaded robes.

“She will make time,” Helena declares.

“Why would I get her?”

Helena can hear Claudia suck in a breath at Curvenal’s attitude. The farther they get away from Eire, the more openly he treats them as vassals.

Helena merely archs a brow. “She serves me.”

That raises his hackles. “She serves no one but King Arthur!”

“Whose queen I will be,” she reminds him.

He is fuming at that, hand reflexively reaching for his sword before he realizes that she is smiling at his outrage. It’s a petty triumph, but her wins have become so few that she isn’t picky about them.

If it were up to Curvenal, Helena would not marry Arthur at all. It may be the only thing they agree on.

His stance is still belligerent, and it is something she can oddly relate to. “It is customary to make peace before landing,” she offers in explanation, and he relaxes marginally.

“I will relay your request,” he bites out and she wants to remind him that it is not a request, it is an order.

When he leaves, she catches sight of a stretch of green through the rail and for a moment, it echoes the memory of Eire. But it isn’t the right coast, and it will never be again.

No green will ever be home again.

Behind her, Claudia is shifting. “It is noble of you to try and offer peace.” She sounds surprised.

And Helena sounds far too calm. “I will not stand for this mockery.”

She is still staring at the spot where Curvenal has stood. Arguing with the henchman of the knight of a vassal, those are the lows she has stooped to.

“She will come,” Claudia tries to reassure her. “You have never asked for her before. She cannot deny you.”

“Perhaps.” It doesn’t matter any longer, and she still hasn’t moved.

“You will have to be around her at court, and she holds standing there.” Claudia is being practical again. “Making amends is the wise thing to do.”

Helena is insulted by the relief in her tone.

When she doesn’t speak, Claudia tries to bridge the silence. “So… what drink do I serve?”

Now Helena turns around. “Get me the chest.”

But Claudia is standing in front of it, her silhouette suddenly larger in the muted light of the cabin. “What do you want with the chest?”

She seems to loom over the space and Helena wonders whether Claudia’s lineage is of old blood.

“Be careful with your mother’s secrets.” Claudia’s voice holds an authority that makes her far older than Helena is.

“I seek peace,” Helena states. Here, she is a supplicant, not the princess.

And the chest opens under Claudia’s fingers. It is unadorned, rough-hewn, the wood dark with age as they kneel before it.

Helena takes in sealed crucibles and small bottles of cloudy glass. Many of them, she has seen in the Queen’s chambers when they still seemed big for her small hands. Her mother’s line is a line of healers, that much has remained.

Wound balms, tinctures, powders. Cures for fevers and bad sleep, philters to curse and for love – that one, she is supposed to drink with Arthur – and, in the far back, the darkest black bottle.

Her hand darts out.

“No.” Claudia shakes her head. “You do not understand with what you are toying.”

“I am not toying.”

“That is not peace, it’s vengeance! She is –“ Claudia lowers her voice. “She is Arthur’s favorite, they will kill you in return.” And they will kill Claudia, too.

Helena shrugs. “If they dare.” She knows it will not come to that.

“Helena...” Now it is Claudia who is pleading with her. “Please, no.”

But Helena is relentless. “Have you forgotten that she killed Nathaniel?”

“In fair duel.”

“Is this fair?” Helena’s hands encompass the dark cabin and the sea, the men on deck and the shore they will be spilled onto. “Mocked and derided, a prisoner in enemy land for life?”

“It doesn’t have to be enemy land,” Claudia argues. “And Arthur might make a good husband.”

Helena closes her eyes. “It is not my path.” Perhaps she has always known that it would have to end this way instead.

“No.” Claudia isn’t ready to give up yet, not with Cornwall already in sight.

“You are to serve me,” Helena reminds her. “Bound by oath.”

For a long moment, there is silence. “Very well,” Claudia says finally, with disgust. She is pale, her lips a thin line. Her hands rummage around the chest and come up with a goblet, silver and carved. “Why do you hate her so much?”

“Hate?” Helena scoffs. She wants her dead, dead and gone. Perhaps it is hate, perhaps it is something else. It does not matter any longer. “She’s just a vassal's vassal who lied.”

Claudia gives her a doubtful look. “She wooed you honestly.”

“For her uncle!” And Helena’s voice is sharp and wounded.

“What is this, Helena?” Claudia sets down the goblet. “You don't even know her!”

Helena glances down at her fingers that are adjusting the heavy pendant around her neck. “No, I suppose not.”

Claudia hasn’t been at court for long, but all it takes is one look at Helena. “You _do_ know her.”

Something white-hot seethes through Helena. “I should have killed her when I could.”

Claudia stares at her aghast and Helena knows she will have to continue. She owes her that much.

“Last year, after the winter storms, when the Cornish refused to pay toll and sent ships ---”

“And Queen Irene sent Sir Nathaniel after them…” Claudia knows the tale.

“I blessed his sword,” Helena remembers bitterly. “And they killed him. She did.”

“The duel was chosen because we did not want a war,” Claudia reminds her, and Helena doesn’t want to hear it.

“And she isn’t to blame for the riots afterwards, either?” All this is Myka’s fault, all of it.

“You weren't even that fond of Sir Nathaniel,” Claudia points out.

“He was a good choice.”

“You were his token reward,” Claudia corrects her. “For his wins against the Normans.” She shrugs as she picks up the small goblet again and begins to polish it. “Rumor says that you rather had your eyes set on Cuán of the Northern Hills.” Back and forth she rubs over a blind spot. “Or even Melisende the Norman, before war broke out.”

“Court gossip.” Helena mutters, but she doesn’t deny the claims. “Yet no one at court knows that I was down by the river the night after the battle. And I ---” She falters. There are things she cannot clothe with words, and without them, they are for her alone. “There was a wounded warrior, left for dead. A woman. I couldn’t kill her… She was no threat. I helped her.”

Claudia’s eyes are bigger than Helena has ever seen.

And Helena is back in that night, with night dampness creeping up from the river and the castle on the hill behind her. Her feet follow the small path with ease, she know it well: down to the willow tree that is brushing the water with its branches. And there, in her spot, where she slips off her shoes and presses her bare toes into the moss, lies the still form of a warrior.

He is still breathing, but his eyes are closed as he lies sprawled out before Helena’s gaze: torn doublet over a trim shoulder, strong fingers curled as if searching for a sword, a brawny thigh devoid of protective leather.

He is no threat like this and when she bends down to check the wound in his shoulder, she sees the slope of his chest and realizes that this is no man at all.

The warrior bears no insignia, neither of Eire, nor any other land that Helena knows, but she is there, alive and breathing and wounded. Helena brushes dark curls away from an even face, and then she drags the warrior up the riverbank, between the curved roots of the tree, and begins to clean her wounds.

At some point, she stirs and eyes as green as the moss blink up at Helena.

“Are you a fay?”

“Not quite,” Helena says.

“I am in no shape to greet a lady.” The warrior woman tries to sit up. “I ---”

Helena recognizes the courtly manners, but they are not at court. She smiles. “Do not worry, then.”

The warrior woman smiles, too. “A fay, then.”

Helena covers her with her coat when she leaves.

And she comes back the following night. And the night after that.

For half a moon, they share the space underneath the whispering roof, bare feet pressed into the moss as the wound slowly mends and the warrior gains strength again.

She gives no name and Helena never asks.

Then, one night, there is the skiff. The warrior has her hair properly braided, she bows and kisses Helena’s hand.

And Helena stands by the willow tree, with her coat once more wrapped around herself, and watches the boat being swallowed by the fog. The last thing she sees is a firm set of shoulders, and a braid falling down a lean back.

It is all Helena has seen of Myka in the entire journey, far up at the helm, when she was walked onto this ship with Claudia. And Claudia is still staring at her.

“I hid her, tended to her wounds.” She should not have helped the enemy, but back then, that was not who they were. “I nursed her back to health.” Helena recalls her own steps on the path to the river in the evenings, quiet and quick. “She told such beautiful stories whenever I came to see her. – One of them was that she was just a simple soldier.” And she wishes Myka wouldn’t have said anything at all.

“…Lady Myka?” Claudia’s voice is but a whisper.

“I didn’t know!” It is despair more than ire.

Claudia thinks quickly. “And did she know who you were?”

“Perhaps not at first,” Helena allows, it is what tears at her more than anything else.

Alarm shines up in Claudia’s face. “What happened?”

The implication hangs heavily between them, more so for an unmarried princess.

“Nothing,” Helena says with dignity. “She left.” Half a moon underneath the willow branches, and then seeing the small skiff disappear into the fog on the river, dew brushing against her face. “But she swore to honor my kindness and serve my name, and to never again raise her sword against Eire.”

“And?” Claudia seems to think that this is a tale told in court by a bard, with measure and sense.

“And I didn't know who she was in truth until she marched up to my mother’s throne, an envoy of Arthur, and demanded my hand for him!”

When Helena reaches again for the small black bottle, Claudia does nothing to stop her.

~***~

“You don’t have to go.” Curvenal’s broad hands adjust the brooch that fixes Myka’s coat on her shoulder. “I can fend them off again.” He fumbles with the intricate gem.

“It is all right.” But Myka sighs, rolling her shoulders.

“She’s just a vassal now,” Curvenal reminds her, and curses inwardly when Myka stiffens at his words. Why his liege feels bound to the haughty princess, he will never know. “You’re giving her the throne – your throne – and she dares to order you around? The only thing she should be saying is, _‘Thank you, my Lord’_.”

“Careful, Petrus.” Myka cracks a smile. “If they made me queen, we would be stuck at court.”

“If it weren’t for your pushing, Arthur wouldn’t even get married,” Curvenal grumbles even as he grimaces at the threat of a court life. “You are his niece, your valor is undisputed –“

“It is not my place.” Myka reaches up to adjust her braid. She hopes she looks enough like a royal envoy, even after the journey they have had.

“Still no reason to let the English throne will fall to a foreign princess and her children,” Curvenal mutters while he helps Myka with her boots and her belt. “I’m telling you, you don’t have to go.”

“Yes, I do.” He is her truest swordsman, her closest friend, but he will never understand why she must heed Helena’s call.

Still, her steps are measured, her hand resting on the hilt of her sword for reassurance as she approaches the cabin.

“Lady Myka of Canoêl,” a squire announced her formally.

There is rustling ahead and with a deep breath, Myka enters. Her eyes need a while to adjust to the darkness and she bends one knee. “Princess.” The grip on her sword is white-knuckled.

Soft steps draw closer, muted by the carpets. From where she is kneeling, Myka can only make out the train of a violet dress.

“Lady Myka.”

The greeting is cool, but Myka’s eyes still close at the sound of her voice and for a moment, it carries the whisper of willow leaves. Then she makes the mistake of looking up.

Standing over her, arms in ornate sleeves crossed over her chest and eyes ablaze, is Princess Helena of Eire. Myka hasn’t looked at her in so long, and she looks like all the songs written about her: pale, noble features and hair like a raven’s wing, hands like white lilies, and dark eyes that seem to speak of the wild moorlands of the North.

And all Myka can do is to fall headlong into that gaze.

On the horizon, there is a thin line of green that will never mean home again.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quote translation:  
> Each as eager as the other  
> they clashed with one another  
> shattering each other's lances  
> which splintered against the shields  
> into a thousand fragments.
> 
> An integral part of the Tristan story in both Gottfried (and Wagner) is Tristan’s wound from his fight against Morold (Nathaniel), which is tended to by Isolde (or her mother), who doesn’t know who he is. Tristan spends a while in the orbit of the Irish court without being recognized. While Tristan (literally: “So sad) is in her care, he switches the syllables of his name to Tantris (literally: “much laughter”) and claims to be a bard.  
> In both Gottfried and Wagner, Isolde eventually figures out who Tristan is (a splinter from his wound fits with Morold's battered sword) while he is still in her care and ponders whether she should kill him.


	3. Chapter 3

3

_si wurden ein und einvalt,_   
_die zwei und zwîvalt wâren ê._   
_si zwei enwâren dô niemê_   
_widerwertic under in._

 (Gottfried von Straßburg, _Tristan_ , v. 11715-11719)

 

A goblet of silver sits on a small table, a beam of light catching on its polished rim.

It is filled to the brim, but Helena does not think of the wine or of what else swirls in its depths. She has not been this close to Myka of Canoêl since no names stood between them. Myka now is a knight, a famed one, right hand to Arthur of Cornwall and escort to his bride.

There are many new names, and yet there are things of nameless familiarity as Helena’s gaze smoothes along Myka’s brow, so often a little furrowed, along the determined line of her jaw and down the gentle slope of her neck. She wears armor now.

Helena sees the fine lines that years of fighting and sleeping under the open sky have begun to carve into her face, sees the few unruly curls that have managed to escape from the braid that falls down her back.

And even kneeling at her feet, Myka is still far away.

There is just the sound of Myka’s armor and the fall of her coat when she finally stands, every inch a knight of the court.

“You called, my Lady?”

“Since you did not think to come of your own.” Helena does not bother to veil the reproach. It will slide off Myka either way, like an enemy arrow trying to pierce her chain mail. There is an old wound underneath her armor that Helena knows well, right across the shoulder, brought on by Nathaniel’s lance and healed by Helena herself, and how dare Myka stand there, righteous and proud, her footing so sure on the moving planks.

She does not speak, and it is Helena again who is looking for a chink in Myka’s stance. “Your queen should be your first concern.”

“She is.” Myka’s features remain impassive, Helena’s snide remark rebounding like another futile arrow. “Bringing my queen safely to shore, which binds me to the helm.”

As smooth and elusive as ever, and Helena’s ire is kindled anew. But this time, she takes a steadying breath and smiles coolly. “We have to lay to rest old guilt before that.”

“What guilt?”

There is the familiar frown, and a trace of discomfort. Helena will take it. “You killed Nathaniel,” she reminds her. “He was my knight.”

“The duel was not about you, it was about our lands.” Myka’s voice is even again. “And we did lay the conflict to rest. Queen Irene and I drank to our treaty in front of the entire hall.”

Helena’s waves the point away with a hand. “I did not drink with you.”

“It was not my intent to kill your beloved,” Myka says, and it sounds stilted. “I did not mean to cause you pain ---”

“Pain?” Helena has taken two steps forward before she can stop herself. She will not be subjected to Myka’s pity. “You insulted my honor by killing my champion!”

“If it is about honor…” Myka seems strangely relieved. “You will have a king and a throne to countervail the slight. And I will be a knight at your service.”

“Will you?” Helena asks scornfully. “A vassal for a champion, a fine exchange!”

Myka balls her hands into fists at that, anger flaring in her gaze. But before Helena can revel in it, Myka has reigned herself in, as she always does.

“And what of your oath, to me and my land?” Helena tilts her head to the side as if she has to ponder her next words. “Or are you not bound by it, since you were concealing your name?”

Myka stoically stares ahead, even as Helena begins to circle her. The small train of Helena's dress is brushing across the floor, a minuscule sound enlarged by the silence.

“And what a hero’s adventure it is!” The soft rustle stops. “To arrive wounded, lie about who you are, be healed by a bride you just left without groom. Only to leave and return later in arms, to claim her hand for another.” Helena’s tone is cool and snide. “Is this how the Cornish woo?”

A muscle along Myka’s jaw clenches, and Helena is relentless.

“Did you see me with his eyes when we looked at each other?” It sounds more vulnerable than Helena intended to. “The ever faithful vassal, procuring a bride for his king?”

Myka sighs, and she suddenly looks very tired. “What do you want, Princess?”

“I should have killed you when I could,” Helena bites out, the anger still clawing at her. Myka always manages to withdraw, even when she hasn’t been close in the first place, just as she disappeared from sight in a skiff to show up again dressed in royal colors.

“If you loved Nathaniel that much…” Myka reaches for her sword, and Helena takes a step back at the metallic singing when Myka draws it a hand’s length from its sheath. “Go ahead, then.” And before Helena can react, Myka is in front of her, takes her hands and forces them around the hilt. “You have saved my life once, you may take it away again.”

Her eyes don't leave Helena's when she steps back, making the sword rattle as it slides free with the movement.

Startled, Helena raises the weapon. She struggles with its weight, but holds it steady as she points the tip at Myka’s chest.

“You are so very sure of yourself, are you not?”

The look in Myka's eye is more exhaustion than defiance, and it makes Helena hesitate. The blade rasps against the chain mail, right above the old wound. Two more moments pass and Helena remembers green moss and the fog over the river.

“If I killed Arthur's favorite vassal, he would open war on Eire.” Slowly, she lets the sword sink and pushes the hilt back at Myka. “I will not let that fall upon my land.”

Myka lifts the weapon with ease and light glints off the blade as she sheathes it again. “Very well, then.” Her tone is curt. “We are approaching shore and I have to see to the landing.”

“We should make peace,” Helena gestures towards the table where the goblet awaits. “And drink to it.” Behind it, Claudia is merging into the shadows of the boat, a silent warning.

“Peace?” Myka eyes her warily.

“To make your triumph complete.” The courteous smile does not reach Helena's eyes. “So that I will willingly let you hand me to Arthur. Me, whose country you fought, whose betrothed you killed, and who in return mended your wounds and agreed to marry your king. – Everything that you wanted.”

Myka takes a breath, her expression unreadable. “As you wish,” she concedes finally. “Peace.”

“I would offer to speak peace underneath a willow tree,” Helena says lightly, another arrow searching for its mark. “Then again, your oaths in such places do not seem to bind you.”

Without turning around, she waves for the drink and Claudia shuffles forward. The reluctance in her steps is mirrored by the tension in Myka’s shoulders as she accepts the goblet and holds it up between her palms.

The claret liquid swirls before Myka, but she is not looking at the wine. She is looking straight at Helena in a way that cuts right through her – tormented, fear and spite warring underneath.

“If this is how you want it to end ---”

She takes one more breath, her eyes still on Helena, and raises the goblet to her lips.

And she drinks.

At first, Helena is frozen in place, but when Myka tips the goblet up to finish the wine, she hurls herself towards her.

“You coward!”

A dark splash of liquid lands on Helena’s dress as she wrangles the goblet from Myka’s grasp. “Both sides need to drink to the peace!” Hastily, she drinks down the rest. She is surprised that it does not taste bitter.

Myka stares at her wide-eyed, and Helena wants to grab her by the shoulders and shake her. “What have you done?” Perhaps she did not expect Myka to accept the drink. Perhaps she expected just another slight, another excuse.

But Myka smiles. “You have saved my life once, you make take it away again.”

Helena wonders how much time they have left.

They are alone now. There is just the sea and the empty goblet, and Cornwall is far away.

Myka listens after the poison in her veins, a willow’s whisper to lull her to sleep. And she allows herself to look at Helena at last. The curve of her lips, the line of her brow, the chiseled features that have haunted her for over a year.

Even now, Helena’s eyes are dark and restless. “Why did you leave?”

“I had no right to stay.” Myka sinks to her knees to stop their trembling.

A rustle of cloth, and then Helena is kneeling right in front of her. “I am here with you now.”

It is just a whisper, and Myka still cannot believe it. She counts the breaths in the silence between them. The darkness of the cabin seeps into her vision and she wonders whether it is supposed to be this gentle, just a lull of endless sleep calling to her. Not the frothing of mad foxes, limbs twisted askew, even though it might be a more truthful echo of her heart.

Cool fingertips brush along her temple and once more, Myka is smiling.

“Are you a fay?”

They are close enough to share a breath and even on the verge of nothingness, Myka remains still, the perfect knight. There may be turmoil in her eyes, but she does not move, not even when Helena’s fingers trail down her cheek, along the faint outline of an old scar, all the way down to her jaw, strong and so determinedly set.

“Even now?” Helena whispers, inching closer, and she feels more than she sees Myka’s shoulders rise and fall on an unsteady breath.

And then she is stealing that very breath with her own, her lips pressed to Myka’s.

And Myka sways. She struggles to stay upright when Helena does not back away, not now, and then Helena can feel fingertips, searching for purchase along her arms, still fighting, always fighting the need underneath.

Myka’s lips move, gasping for breath and finding Helena instead, and then she is kissing her back.

And Helena wants to die on the spot, and she wants to live forever.

Myka is kissing her in a way that makes her limbs grow weak even as she throws her arms around Myka’s neck, the sleeves of her dress catching on the chain mail with a small crack as they tear, but there is nothing beyond them now, nothing beyond this kiss and she is holding on for the dear life that is fading away from them.

Feverishly, she pushes closer still, hands curled into a thick braid – so formal, so severe, so _very_ Myka – and sighs into the kiss when a pair of arms closes firmly around her waist, and something in Myka seems to snap.

Helena senses it in the urgency of her touch, and Helena is liquid fire, between tongue and teeth, and she answers the kiss with helpless abandon even as she is aware of the salty wetness on Myka’s cheeks.

This, this will be the last thing she knows, the last thing she will be, and then Helena of Eire will be no more.

Just one more shared breath, and then another. Just one more graze of those lips, so stubbornly pressed into a line for this entire journey, and yet Helena has seen them curve into a smile, once, underneath a willow tree. And they are against hers now, open, soft and pliant, and Helena flings herself forward into the abyss with a laugh.

It takes her long moments to become aware of other sets of hands pulling at her, and was there a muffled cry just now?

Strong arms are prying them apart, taking her away from the warmth that is Myka, from Myka who is everything, and Helena shivers at the loss. She blinks her eyes open, unseeing, only to find Myka across the room.

She is struggling towards Helena and a cursing Curvenal has trouble holding her back. Slowly, Helena becomes aware of Claudia, of servants rummaging around the cabin, collecting clothes and chests.

Among the bustle of people, she finds that it Claudia is holding her up, keeping her body that is straining towards Myka with unexpected strength.

“What is happening? Why ---”

Claudia gestures helplessly. “I could not let you die.”

“But…” Helena’s mind is wheeling, racing through the possibilities. She raises a hand to her lips that are still tingling with Myka’s kisses. Her stomach sinks as she realizes what must have transpired. “The love potion?”

With a dull scrape, the ship meets the pier of Cornwall. Busy hands place the ornate royal coat on Helena’s shoulders, gold and green, and she stumbles under the weight of it.

She is pulled forward towards the deck, bejeweled sleeves dragging behind her, and as she is lifted upwards, she turns her head to find Myka again, who is still standing held back by Curvenal.

Helena has never seen her so pale, and the last thing she knows before she is hauled into the light are tousled curls, mussed by her own hands, and eyes as green as she shores of Eire.

A goblet of silver sits on a small table, a beam of light catching on its polished rim.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quote Translation:  
> Those who once were two and duple  
> now were one and unity.  
> Never more would they two  
> discord one with the other.


	4. Chapter 4

4

 

_ir dewederez enmahte_   
_gehaben ruowe noch gemach,_   
_wan sô ez daz andere sach._   
_sô s'aber ein ander sâhen,_   
_daz gieng in aber nâhen,_   
_wan sî enmohten under in zwein_   
_ir willen niht gehaben in ein._

                                                                         (Gottfried von Straßburg, _Tristan_ , v. 11894-11899)

 

A willow tree grows by the garden gate, whispering over the tall walls by night.

They have to pass the gate on their way to the church, and they ride past without taking note of it. It is easy, the way it ducks out of sight in between two heavy pillars of stone. Myka wishes she could do the same.

Helena looks radiant. She is wearing a crown of small flowers, a queen by much older rights, and the way people along the road bow to her makes Myka recall that Beltane passed a few nights ago.

Helena does not adhere to gods residing in stone cathedrals, even though she will not speak of that here in Cornwall, but once, under another willow tree, she told a wounded warrior, and Myka has not forgotten. She also sees how pale Helena is underneath the regalia, but she does not sway atop the horse that carries her, side saddle, to the ceremony.

Her breath catches in the brief moment her eyes meet Myka’s, when Myka does not manage to duck into the streak of festiveness in time.

Myka does not want to trail along. She desperately wants to be somewhere else on this day – surrounded by the curved blades of the Moors, or at the end of the world, beyond the rocky shores of Thule. Somewhere where she does not have to see Helena’s hand in Arthur’s grasp, or the ribbon tied around their wrists.

She does not want to see it, yet she cannot tear her eyes away.

Helena seems calm in front of the altar. Myka is standing behind her, but she can see how her shoulders raise and fall with even breaths. Only when she turns to the side, she wavers a little, and Myka wonders whether Claudia has given her another drink to dull the fear and the rage.

She thinks of it as an act of mercy, and for a moment Myka asks herself bitterly why they could not have died right then and there on the ship. But all it takes is one look at Helena, at the rise and fall of her shoulders, and she knows that she will cling to life for as long as Helena breathes.

Arthur cuts an imposing figure today. His hair is generously streaked with silver now, and it gives him an air of dignity while his stout frame exudes power, mirrored by the battle scars visible along his cheeks. He makes a better king than a warrior, though, something that Myka wishes he would not so readily admit.

For so long Myka has pleaded with him to take a wife for the stability of the land and the crown, and now that he finally heeds her advice, it is a bitter triumph. But Cornwall needs a queen to quiet the covetous voices that surround the throne. Arthur holds the land at peace, a feat that will crumble to bits without a wife to pass on the legacy, a wife to bear heirs with a lineage beyond doubt.

And Myka’s plan was fruitful. She sees how Arthur’s eyes light up when he looks at Helena. They already did when he first met her. Helena has not raged against him and she has made no attempt on his life, not that Myka knows of. Instead, she treats him with a kindness that reminds Myka of a roof of willow leaves and the gurgle of the river blending with Helena’s voice, and it makes Myka burn with envy and a yearning she knows she has no right to feel.

Yet Arthur looks at Helena without need, the need that is eating Myka up underneath the polished metal and brocaded doublet she wears today. She hates Arthur’s hand on Helena’s arm as he guides her to sit, so close to where Myka is sitting. It is a place of honor for the niece of the King, the next one in line to the throne, at least until they will walk out of this cathedral. Then Helena will be queen. And Myka will merely be a knight to the throne – to Arthur, who looks at her now with such gratitude, his hand still wrapped around Helena’s, that Myka wishes Nathaniel would have run her through in duel.

Now his bride is Arthur’s, but Myka’s eyes are still straying to where they shouldn’t, following the fall of black hair and the cadence of the Queen’s steps. And then she has to look at her again bound by duty. They have to share a drink, the royal couple and those closest to the crown, to lay false claims to rest.

There is the King’s aging aunt, Lady Rowena, and the King’s cousin, James MacMelot, but no one is closer than Myka.

The goblet passes from the King to his queen and behind her, Myka can see Claudia of Braen, standing motionless among the whispers of the ladies-in-waiting. Her eyes never leave Helena, and they narrow as Helena hands the goblet to Myka of Canoêl in front of the entire court.

Their fingers brush, making Myka look up sharply. Helena’s expression is distant. But as Myka shifts the goblet into her grasp, with the eyes of everyone on them, Helena runs two fingertips across the back of Myka’s hand. It is deliberate, and Myka nearly drops the drink. The wine trembles against her lips when she finally manages to raise it to her mouth, and something inside of her quivers along with it.

She manages to avoid the Queen after that, focusing on Arthur instead, until she is seated right across from Helena during the feast.

Dusk has brought on a multitude of candles and their light molds itself to Helena’s features. Myka watches as Helena lifts a grape to parted lips, and she does not taste any of the food she is eating. All she can see is Helena, Helena’s mouth curved into a smile.

Now Helena wears a small crown of gold. She is the Queen and Myka should be happy.

Voices drift up from the courtyard and Myka wishes she was out there, where the wine is cheaper and the laughter is louder, alongside Curvenal and the other warriors. But she is cooped up in the banquet hall, close to the King, avoiding meeting Helena’s eyes across the table.

She is aghast at herself, at how she can do this to Arthur, and yet all she can think of is Helena and not even the remotest desert will be able to take these thoughts away.

Helena appears on the balcony the next morning and Myka cannot bear the King’s smile and stares at her boots instead.

There have been skirmishes up at the edges of Northumbria for a while, but now they have turned into a swath of fire and sword. The clans are feared, and the North is far. Still, Cornwall has to maintain the borders. And Myka asks to lead the command of the Cornish.

The King protests her request. If he has to sacrifice her, it will not be in senseless bloodshed. She is too important to the crown, and to him.

“She will gain in standing when I am gone,” Myka reasons with him. “As long as I am here, there will be those who would prefer to see me in line to the throne.”

“Everyone knows that I tried that, and everyone knows that you do not want it,” Arthur grumbles.

“They could still weaken you, my Lord,” Myka warns. “Both you and the crown.”

Arthur sighs. He knows that she is right. “And if I send you on this break-neck foray, an errand that does not require a knight of your standing? Will people not say that I am trying to get rid of you, to get you killed?”

“And it would further your standing,” Myka observes calmly. “It would show you unafraid of making hard choices.”

“You are my right arm,” the King reminds her and Myka cannot take the affection in his tone. “You are the shield of Cornwall in the field.”

“Then let me go, my Lord,” Myka pleads. She straightens. “I defeated Nathaniel of Eire, perhaps I will slay the favorite of Uilliam as well and return to you with more glory for the crown.”

But part of her hopes that she will die up there, and die with honor, because otherwise she will die of need for Helena.

She wants to leave quickly, without farewells. The command is small and their route a secret, but the castle walls seem to whisper it through the corridors regardless.

Dusk already hugs the dark passageways when Myka returns from the stables, sword at her side. Somewhere there is the scent of lilacs. The horses are waiting, but as Myka’s boots resound underneath an arc of stone, light steps move into her path. And there is Helena, a silhouette of white, and long sleeves wind around Myka’s neck.

Myka is half in armor already, yet Helena’s hands easily come to rest on her breastbone, with just a thin tunic between her heartbeat and Helena’s fingers.

Helena’s hair brushes against Myka’s cheek as she leans closer.

“Do not leave me.”

“I cannot stay,” Myka says, even as she ends up cornered against the wall behind her, and even though she knows, more than ever, that nothing in her body or her mind could ever take leave of her Queen.

And then Helena is kissing her again, and this time, it is Helena’s cheeks that are streaked with tears. Somehow, Myka’s hands end up on Helena’s hips and she can feel the warmth of her through the fabric of her dress. Myka know that she should not kiss her back, but then Helena curves into her just a little bit and Myka knows nothing more but the body in her arms and the lips against her own.

Just one moment of bliss, blazing high, then heavy steps sound behind them.

Myka pulls away with difficulty and struggles to draw breath. She cannot make out Helena’s eyes in the dark, but her fingers are trembling. The evening air is suddenly cold against her lips, making them ache for more, along with the burning in her chest that is clawing at her.

Before she can speak, Helena is gone, a brush of white sleeves and black hair that melts into the darkness.

One of Myka’s warriors steps up to her, saddle on his shoulder, and Myka pushes away from the wall with a nod and follows him.

Helena is not there when Myka leaves, bending a knee and bidding her King farewell.

But Helena is watching after her from the merlons of the north tower, unbeknownst, and she is glaring in envy at Curvenal who rides at Myka’s side. They ride fast and Helena watches until the green of Myka’s coat blends into the fields around her.

And Helena waits.

It is a break-neck command and when they tell her, the Queen smashes a priceless window of stained glass with her fist.

Arthur merely looks as if he has wanted to break it himself. The nights with him are not the worst, thankfully rare as they are, but Helena is not sure she can bear with his gratitude at her compassion. It is not about him, it will never be. There is only Myka.

And Helena waits. From the merlons, she watches the doves and the falcons fly past and return. When dusk falls, even the nights seem too small to fit all of her restless heart.

Claudia knows her way around the court much sooner than Helena does. She listens to the rumors in the halls and carries them back to Helena.

How Lady Myka was slated to be heiress to the throne, and how the King might have wed her himself, had she not been his niece. Then again, it would be a shame to tie such a fine warrior to childbirth and the confines of the court.

How Myka, despite what Helena admits to Claudia in a whisper, couldn’t very well have wooed Helena for herself – “She may get away with being a knight because she is so close to the throne, but she is only the King’s niece, and of no standing to woo a princess.”

Helena asks about news from the Northern borders, frequently enough to make courtiers talk.

One of the court ladies, blonde hair streaked with gray, looks at her with disdain. “He honors his vows, I suggest you honor yours.”

“Courtiers always talk,” Helena dismisses Claudia’s concerns.

“The Lady Vanessa.” Claudia is all but wringing her hands. “She is the King’s favorite, and he once asked for her hand, but she refused since she is too old to bear an heir to the throne.” She gives Helena a pointed glance. “He does not go to her because he honors his vows.”

But vows are just words, and Helena was bound by eyes the shade of Eire before she ever stood in front of Arthur. She does not adhere to the rules of gods who live in cathedrals of stone.

But Lady Myka does.

And Myka rides hard, she rides up North, to the Moorlands, and perhaps the moors will swallow her up. Their horses are sweat-soaked and she sees Curvenal’s wordless frown, and yet she urges them on. There is quiet grumbling among the knights and warriors under her banner, but they will follow her, everywhere. Such is her fame.

And Myka is fury, bright and relentless. Curvenal doubts that a single clan will uphold its claims by the time they arrive on the heel of the stories preceding them.

Up here, the air is damp even at this time of year. St. John is approaching, not that Curvenal pays much attention to the Saints. They sit by the fire at night, underneath the stars, and Myka stares into the flames as she cleans her sword. She looks grim and the rage is unlike her.

Curvenal is the one who rages, Myka is the one who reminds him that there is a court, and an order of things. But this time, Myka throws herself into every rencounter, into every ditch they are forced to set up camp in.

“What?!”

She has caught his gaze across the fire and is impatient already.

“My words,” Curvenal mutters. He knows her too well to be cowed by her. “What the hell?”

Myka shrugs uncomfortably. “I was getting antsy at court.”

She looks abashed, but Curvenal does not accept her explanation. “We have been away from court for weeks.” He is a weathered swordsman, not used to mince his words. “If you were a courtier, I’d say you’re hung up on one of the ladies.”

There have been ladies around his liege, though not a great a many, which makes Curvenal joke that all the ones Myka refuses, he picks up. He does not mind being second choice, and Myka has never been hung up on any of them. Curvenal sees her as an equal in spirit, preferring swords and the open sky to perfumed verses and curtsies and bows.

“Good thing that I am not a courtier, then.”

“Good thing, yes.” Curvenal is unconvinced, but he tosses another handful of twigs into the flames and tries to make light of it. “A courtier would break a fancy rapier he never used, weep over a few roses and write horrible songs.”

Myka tears through the invaders instead and by the time they make it to the Northern borders, there is no one left to fight.

Curvenal asks her again, but the look Myka gives him is so laden with guilt that he does not dare to insist.

When they return – even the moors spat us out, Curvenal jokes, but Myka’s laughter becomes thinner as they draw closer to Cornwall – the tidings precede them. Curvenal notes the sorrow that surrounds Myka, but at the same time, there is something wild and breathless about her that makes her more alive than he has ever seen her, and he knows her well.

When they return, Helena has waited so deeply, so desperately, that to her, it seems that years have passed instead of months, twisting her heart like old age twists fingers into painful numbness.

Her place is next to the king and they watch them approach, galloping freely with the banner of Cornwall high in the wind. These last minutes are the longest, and Helena is afraid they will never pass. Her knuckles are white on the arms of her chair. The messengers have said that Myka is unhurt, but she needs to see it with her own eyes.

And then they draw closer, close enough to be seen, and they ride in like a wave of summer. Myka’s face is unguarded, hair flying about her shoulders unbraided, riding strong and tall at the front of the command. She raises a metal-clad arm to greet the King, but as she tips up her face to the walls of the castle the joy in her eyes as she sees Helena, finally sees her, it is wiping the endless months of fitful worry away.

And Helena wants to hurl herself down the bridge and throw herself into Myka’s arms and the scent of her until even that most ephemeral touch will be imprinted indelibly into her senses.

It is not how the Queen greets the champion of the reign. Arthur’s hand is on hers, and when Helena looks at him now, he seems nearly as happy as she is, smiling with unguarded relief.

And Myka does not understand how she could have wanted to disappear in the moorlands, and not see Helena ever again. In a flash of white and black up on the walls, all the colors have returned to Myka’s life and she feels as if she has never really taken note of them before. Helena has driven her away, far up North, but it is also Helena who has called her back.

Now the hooves of the horses have stilled and Myka will be received in the throne hall. She will kneel at the feet of the King, and she will be close enough to touch the seam of Helena’s dress with her sword hand.

She wants to race up the stone stairs, but she walks with measurement, the helmet under her arm. Only her heartbeat is hurrying ahead of her, stumbling and rushing ahead with the rhythm of Helena’s name.

The last hallway seems endless, the doors already opened, and Myka fears she will burst into a hundred pieces before she can make it to the dais and stand before Helena. She does not care who will stand next to her, she is coming home to her Queen.

And finally, Myka is there, but she does not dare to look up into Helena’s eyes, so she looks at her hands and bends a knee. It is Arthur whose hands tug at her shoulders, who hugs her and will not let go of her again. Out of the corner of her eye, Myka sees James MacMelot, and Claudia hovering close to the throne.

The train of Helena’s dress brushes against Myka’s fingers as she passes her, the royal couple preceding the returned knights to the banquet hall for the feast.

Helena is sitting at the head of the table, next to the King, and every time she smiles, Myka cannot breathe, and it is envy and joy intertwined. In the months she has been gone – the summer soon will wilt away – perhaps Helena has grown closer to Arthur. She is his Queen, and Myka is merely a knight whose knife clutters to the table when Helena laughs and looks her way.

Myka leaves the tales to Curvenal tonight, he is better with them in any case, and the court laughs at his stories. Myka watches Helena’s fingers curl around a cup of wine, watches the cup being raised to finely curved lips, and jolts when, unexpectedly, Helena’s eyes meet hers over the rim of the cup.

And all Myka can think is that Helena truly has turned into a Queen. Her gaze is not hesitant, not courteous. It demands.

Heat suffuses Myka’s face and she hastens to drown the sensation in her own cup, but she can feel Helena’s eyes on her skin like a touch. When she looks down at her hand, she sees that it has curled into a fist and the shiver than runs through her raises the fine hairs along her forearms. Their strength is undisputed, years of sword and shield having sculpted them, but tonight they tremble with the mere thought of a woman.

When Myka looks up again, Helena is still staring at her, cup half raised to her lips.

The laughter around them fades away from Myka’s ears, replaced by the drum of her own pulse. She knows there are ladies and pages and warriors around her, yet she can only see Helena. Everything that she is tries to crawl out of her skin and towards her.

There is music and song later, and the knights under Myka’s command try to remember steps that are dancing and not fighting, and words that are gallant and not bellows. Helena weaves through the crowd effortlessly and in the way people align around her as she walks Myka recognizes a queen.

She stands to the side, grateful for the shadows of the tapestries, but then Helena brushes past her again, close enough for Myka to feel the shift in the air. Helena walks out to the courtyard, into the night, alone.

Myka takes a deep breath, and another, and even as she knows that she should not, her feet are carrying her towards the courtyard.

Helena is leaning into the shadows at the bottom of the stairs, where the night and the garden begin. She does not move as she watches Myka approach, steps heavy and laden with want, and Helena finds her own blood echoing it.

She shifts on her feet when Myka finally stands before her and she can see how strong shoulders rise and fall with unsteady breaths. Leave it to Myka of Canoêl to doggedly try and fight something they have drunk to months ago. It is pointless, and maddeningly alluring.

Helena’s teeth dig into her lower lip as she watches Myka struggle. She still does not speak. Her hands find a hold on the wall behind her as she looks up at Myka, and then she merely archs a brow.

Her breath rushes out of her, startled, as she finds herself pushed firmly into the wall at her back, and then Myka’s hands are on both sides of her head. Helena barely has the time to look at Myka’s lips, so soft and so full, before they move against her own.

Helena’s mouth opens unasked and Myka’s arms close around her as they fall into each other, a mindless kiss interrupted only by words that would make no sense to anyone else.

“I died with you out there,” Helena confesses against Myka’s lips.

And Myka murmurs, “I tried to,” but her mouth is already on Helena’s again.

Helena pulls Myka an inch away by the hands she has pushed through her curls. “Don’t you dare.”

Her eyes are as dark as Myka has ever seen them. “I could not see you with him,” Myka admits, and Helena’s eyes soften.

“See only me.” She archs into Myka’s lips against her ear.

Myka’s hands are restless along her back, her arms. “Tell me you are not his.”

“I am not his,” Helena swears feverishly as her head falls against the wall behind her. “I never was. Not Nathaniel’s, not Arthur’s… Only yours.”

She clashes their mouths together and Myka is drinking her in, cradling her face with her fingers splayed wide, as if she is afraid to miss even the smallest detail. Helena reaches for her blindly and they gasp for breath, staring at each other unseeing while their bodies press close, singing with the nearness of the other. Helena has never been so alive, and if Myka presses just one more kiss to her throat – open-mouthed and hot and heedless of the royal chain around her neck – she will dissolve into the night like the fires of Samhain.

The throaty cry of a fox startles them enough to draw them apart and Myka staggers backward, holding onto her sword. The ornaments on the bodice of Helena’s dress rise and fall and rise and fall in the thin light, her mouth still torn open, and she steps towards Myka again because her body does not know to do anything else.

And Myka leans in, a hand lifting to Helena’s cheek, but then Claudia is suddenly between them, a blur of red with rushed breath and wild hair.

“The King…!”

She pushes Helena away and Myka stumbles into the dark, feeling like the entire canopy of the starry sky would fit in her chest as she leans against the wall and struggles to catch her breath.

A willow tree grows by the garden gate, whispering over the tall walls by night.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quote Translation:
> 
> Neither of them was able  
> to find any rest or comfort  
> except in each other's sight.  
> But when they gazed at each other,  
> that perturbed them also,  
> since between them they could not  
> reconcile their desires.


	5. Chapter 5

5

_si sâhen beide ein ander an,_   
_dâ generten si sich van._   
_der wuocher, den daz ouge bar,_   
_daz was ir zweier lîpnar._   
_si enâzen niht dar inne_   
_wan muot unde minne._   


(Gottfried von Straßburg, _Tristan_ , v. 16815-16820)

 

Few are the moments they manage to steal from underneath the mantle of night.

A banquet for a Norman leader, a hunting party, a jousting at court. And only afterwards, there may be a handful of whispered minutes, with a fretful Claudia always hovering just out of sight.

When the Norman envoy visits, Myka is required to wear chainmail and sword belt. Arthur wants her to look her most intimidating and Myka only wants to look at Helena at the head of the table.

The Norman envoy, who is seated next to the Queen, seems to share her thoughts. His eyes glaze over every time Helena speaks to him and Myka holds onto her cup tightly enough to expect dents in the silver when she sets it down again.

Helena wears a dress of rich green, the belt around her hips heavy with embroidery, and her hair shimmers like raven ink in the light of the torches that line the hall, while Myka’s palm echoes the sensation of silken strands. Behind Helena, the large tapestry moves with the steps of the pages hurrying past, until Helena, turning her head and smiling, looks like an ornament in its center.

It seems so much later when the hall lies devoid of steps and voices, but the tapestry is still moving. Perhaps it is the draft that slants in through the window openings, or perhaps it is the rush of the two forms entwined in the alcove behind it.

The roast and the wine have disappeared and so has the knot that kept Myka’s braid in place. The front of her tunic is hanging open, a pair of hands pulling it further apart, and Myka cannot suppress a shiver when Helena’s lips are close enough to breathe against her skin.

She has no sword here, no shield, no means to defend herself. She cannot fathom that she is kissing the wife of her King, in his own banquet hall. But she can imagine letting go of Helena even less.

The ornate belt drops to the floor and Myka’s hands brush the royal pendant around Helena’s neck out of the way. And there is the way Helena’s fingers curl with intent into her unlaced tunic in reply. It has Myka stumbling forward, blindly, to where she is beckoned.

She can feel Helena’s warmth already on her lips when Claudia coughs and draws them apart, with difficulty, their legs and hands slow as if trapped in honey.

Helena recovers first. Myka watches as she smoothly bends down to pick up her belt and when she stands again, Myka's hands have curved themselves to echo the slope of Helena’s hips without conscious thought.

“Why, Myka of Canoêl –” Helena's breaths still come a little quicker, and she is still so close and Myka cannot move a single limb. “Do you intend to make this alcove your camp for the night?”

It is a gentle tease when the way they have to listen to steps at the other side of the tapestry does not allow for such gentleness, but Helena carves the moment out of the guilt that surrounds them.

Myka stops, even though she yet has to move. A quip about choosing a swim in a cold lake for the night dies on her lips when Helena closes the brooch of her belt and adjusts its fall. It is a useless labor since she will take it off again in mere minutes, in her chambers.

Her hands still, and Myka knows what her own fervent gaze is telling: her hope that the light in Helena’s window will not burn tonight. That it will not be Arthur to loosen this belt, not tonight.

Helena’s smile is small and sad. “It is easier when I can think of you.” Fingers brush along Myka’s jaw, a last stolen gesture that feels like an apology.

And then the Queen is gone, and the light in her window burns at Myka’s back as she crosses the courtyard in the dark, towards the stables. She will ride and ride until the light stops shining, until the night swallows her whole.

The horses are calm and rested again for the hunt and the bright day knows nothing of the night.

The ladies of the court are invited to the hunt, which has the courtiers hoping for a wolf, a bear or a fox. Their laughter is more raucous, their steps broader.

The morning is still new and Myka sees Claudia, pale atop her horse behind the Queen and the King, amidst impatient hooves and dogs tearing at their leashes. Myka casts down her gaze when they ride past. She does not dare to meet Arthur’s eyes any longer. Of Helena, she only catches a glimpse, the fall of her skirts and a gloved hand on the pommel. Her heart races regardless.

Next to the King, MacMelot offers to side with the Queen, a task that falls onto a gallant knight when the hunt rides faster.

Myka is staying in the back, close to the lines of the archers, and like arrows, they dash forward into the field at the first sound of the horn. She disappears in the rhythm of the hooves, her heart stretched wide underneath the sky, lost honor forgotten. The forest welcomes her in an embrace of green.

It is so easy to stray from the hunt and its hounds and this is how they meet, in a clearing among firs. The horns and the bark of the dogs sound farther and farther away, until all that remains is the breath of their horses and the rustle of green around them. The air is cooler here than out in the fields, but there is nothing cool about the way they look at each other.

There is no MacMelot, and Claudia does her best to blend into the fir trees unseeing.

They may have but a minute before they have to rejoin the hunt, apart from each other, yet there is no rush. There is no time to dismount, but as Myka brings her horse over, it is enough to see Helena, how Helena does not look away from Myka’s face at all, hungrily making up for all the times at court where she cannot look. She does not even blink.

And Myka does not try to hide the smile that lights up her entire face and crinkles the fine lines around her eyes. This time, she does not have to.

Helena still looks at her when she reaches for one of her own hands and, slowly, removes the glove covering her fingers.

Around them, the forest seems to echo their breathing and Myka takes that bare hand, the hand of her Queen, and presses a kiss to the back of it. And then she holds onto it because she can. Their only witnesses are the trees and Claudia, who is discreetly glancing elsewhere.

This is how Arthur held Helena’s hand at the cathedral, and now Myka is doing it and Helena is smiling, and it is enough.

Snaps in the thicket raise their horses’ heads and Claudia, alert even before the sound reaches their ears, pushes forward as Myka backs away.

MacMelot, assigned to ride with the Queen, breaks into the clearing.

“Sir James, there you are,” Helena offers nonchalantly.

MacMelot’s eyes are drawn to her bare hand.

“We were getting worried about being lost,” Helena continues. “Thankfully, Lady Myka found us.”

“Thankfully,” MacMelot repeats. “Yes.” His eyes flit back and forth between Myka’s face and Helena’s bare hand.

There is a hint of a blush on Helena’s features, something that might be put there by the ride in the breeze and Myka has to remind herself to look away. As soon as she is in Helena’s presence, she finds her body angling towards her like a pilgrim's heart towards the altar.

She does not trust herself to speak, but perhaps it does not even take that. Anyone who looks at her can see Helena reverberate in her in these instants. Myka is a bell with its bronze hit by sound and her lips still echo the smile she now has to hide again. And when she turns her horse around brusquely and trots away, she realizes that even her breathing changes around Helena.

Someone is bound to find out.

Few are the functions at court the Queen does not have to attend. To some of them, Myka is summoned as well, as a knight of the crown, and she stands and watches as all eyes are on Helena. So are Myka’s. And Helena is in the light, and the light never goes out again.

A sunshade covers the balcony for the summer jousting, shielding the ladies and the nobility. This time, it is Myka in the light and Helena takes keen note of the whispers among her ladies when Myka rides past the balcony and raises her sword arm in greeting. A few sighs blend with the whispers and Helena straightens.

Below, on her horse, Myka cuts a dashing figure. She wears the colors of no lady, just those of Cornwall, although from underneath the sunshade, a few gloves rain onto the ground. Some of the court ladies are far too forward, Helena finds. She shifts in her seat when Myka slides to the ground to gallantly pick up the offerings and looks up to the balcony again with a bow.

When more whispers ensue, Helena wants to command that she wear none of those gloves on her armor today.

Her eyes follow Myka, the line of her arm, as she pulls herself back up into the saddle with ease, and Helena shifts again. She halfheartedly answers Arthur’s smile, next to her, but her heart beats faster when she sees Myka heft the jousting lance. Her lips part involuntarily as she watches Myka ride to the start position, thighs firmly molded to her horse. The rhythm and shift of muscle strings Helena along, strength barely held in tow, waiting to be released. She catches herself before she can shift in her seat again.

She has not kissed Myka in so long. She counts the days and the hidden glances above the rim of a goblet. So many nights, she sees Myka walk away while Helena has to entertain. She knows that Myka will be in the stables or at the sparring fields then, and Helena hungers for the body forged in those nights and for all the glances they have not shared.

Now all eyes are on Myka. She is adept at these courtly games, gallant and enough of a warrior, but with an even face that makes the ladies sigh. When Helena looks at Myka, she does not even have breath left to sigh.

Myka’s first opponent is a bulky brute of a warrior and Helena’s brow furrows in concern. The laughter among the courtiers to her left dies down, and Helena gasps when a jousting lance hits Myka with full force in the shoulder, the one she once healed. MacMelot looks at her sharply, but Helena has no time for that, she needs to see how Myka sways and struggles, but does not fall. And Myka wins and later, Helena finds herself gasping again, when she has a brief minute by the armory tent to crown the champion of the tournament with more than a wreath.

But the more she has, the more she needs. The stolen moments barely amount to half hours, even though Claudia lies and cheats and covers for them.

Claudia still does not complain. Her lips are drawn into a thin line at the Queen’s requests, but she does not protest like she did when Helena first reached for the darkest black bottle in the chest.

It is the bottle Myka wishes for on the nights when the light in Helena’s windows will not die down and she stands and stares and she wants to drink or die or to have Arthur drink it instead.

And then someone finds out.

“The Queen?” Curvenal roars. “By the Wild Hunt and all the witches – the Queen?!”

Myka has glanced up at the lit window once too often and Curvenal looks as if he wants to strangle someone, preferable the Queen. He has never seen his liege like this, desperate and restless, but even he has to admit, if grudgingly, that he has never seen her this joyful, either.

“She put a spell on you, didn’t she? She and that witch of Braen…”

Myka laughs, but she does not laugh any longer when Curvenal has the King send them on an errand to the duchies in the East. It is six nights in ditches under a cold moon and Helena believes that she must die during each of them, each night where she does not know Myka underneath her window.

Curvenal just tells Myka, “You will thank me later,” and Myka wants to kill him, too, as they ride away.

But when they return, she is still the same. Much to Curvenal’s chagrin, there is no spell in sight.

“I need to see her. I need…”

Curvenal wants to speak up, but shuts his mouth again because there is nothing to say. He is loyal to his King, but his first oath is to Myka. Where she goes, he will go. And if she needs his word so that she can see the Queen, so be it. Myka has saved his life time and again, and he has saved hers, and if she needs him to save her one more time, he will do it.

For six days and six nights, Helena has been jealous of Curvenal, who gets to ride at Myka’s side. She is jealous of the stable boys and the squires who hand her reins and weapons, who see her ride out with taut poise and return in hot sweat. She is jealous of the horses under Myka’s hands and the grass under their hooves.

The way she longs for Myka – the one who defeated Eire, the one who bartered for her hand – should embarrass Helena, but it does not. She listens to her blood, and only her blood. The reign does not concern her, it is not her reign. All that is hers is Myka. But Myka struggles. With honor, with duty, with her oath. And yet she comes back to Helena every time.

It is MacMelot who urges the King to sign an agreement with the Eastern duchies after Myka and Curvenal return. It is MacMelot who argues that Arthur should travel himself, to make a stand. The King has not been gone for a single night since the wedding, but now he will stay away from the castle for two nights – two full nights – and Helena can barely believe her luck.

“Not tonight,” Claudia says sternly.

Helena looks at her as if she has gone mad. “Myka has returned, and Arthur is not here.”

“Perhaps not the King, but the court is,” Claudia reminds her. “There are eyes and ears everywhere.”

“So are yours. And you will stand guard,” Helena decides with impatience. The sun is straining to touch the horizon already, and she will not be denied, not tonight. “I must see her. I must –“

“If you want to get yourself killed!”

But Claudia’s warning passes unheeded as Helena looks out at the sinking sun again, willing it to move faster. “I will die if I do not see her tonight.”

She sounds so utterly convinced that even Claudia is inclined to believe it.

A night, an entire night! Everything about Helena is impatience, an archer’s arrow quivering with the nearness of flight, and with the promise of Myka’s arms at the other end of the arc.

There is no place for them within the castle, as Claudia does not tire to point out to her, but Helena does not care. She will be in the garden, past the gate by the willow tree. It is still summer, and no roof can contain what she feels.

She waits on the merlons, her dress covered by a dark coat. She waits for the moment when the crowns of the trees will blend into the night enough to be of the same indelible ink. Only then she will put out the torch, the torch Myka must be staring at, down past the bridge, waiting for her.

Claudia has made Helena promise to wait until then, Claudia, who will watch from the walls and will tell everyone that the Queen has retired early in absence of her husband.

And Helena cannot wait any longer. She is bursting forth, beyond the seams of herself, as the stars begin to dot the sky.

“Don't put out the torch,” Claudia pleads with her. “Not yet!”

But Helena looks at her and laughs as she tosses the torch into the sand and then she is already on the stairs, rushing towards ground, towards the garden, with the train of her dress trailing behind her, lifted by the haste of her steps.

And she waits. These are the last days of summer, with chill nipping at the nights already, but this evening, the air is a balmy simmer that trembles against her skin, in her lungs, and she wants to scream because it is both too much and not nearly enough.

She counts the heartbeats now, strained by the wait, until she will see Myka, finally see her again. Her gaze burns against the dark outline of the garden gate, willing Myka to walk through it so that she may rush towards her and fall into her until no one, not even Claudia, will be able to tell them apart in the dark, hair shaded to the same ink by the night.

Her fingers bend and uncurl, waiting to find hold on the curve of Myka's shoulders with no armor between them.

And still the night is too soft against her skin.

The willow leaves whisper across the wall and through garden gate she will come. Helena has left the shadows already to be close to the gate, even though Claudia has forbidden her to do so.

The Queen is so hard to hide. There is a flock of people swarming around her at all times and it has taken her to claim herself unwell so that she may disappear. Rumor already has it that she is with child. It gives her space to breathe at court, even as it drives Myka mad and makes her hands more desperate, but Helena does not mind the ferocity.

Steps, finally, on the other side of the wall, but they disappear again, dragging Helena with them. Then a creak of wood and metal, a rustle, and there, sharp against the thin moon, a line of strong shoulders, braid falling down a lean back.

Helena's mouth turns dry as her knees start to give way and she is too weak to call out, too weak to do anything but _want_.

Myka walks closer, scouring the dark, and then a frisson of pure brightness passes over her face. She is running, care cast aside, and Helena hears herself laughing giddily. Only at the last yard they stop. Helena knows that Myka's drunken disbelief mirrors her on, and then she throws herself forward, stumbling into a desperate embrace. Her arms close around Myka's neck, around the scent of her and the brush of wild curls. In the night, only her hands are visible, clinging tightly to Myka and building a haven for the two of them.

She is not even kissing her, the need to simply hold her is greater, to feel her breaths tight underneath her skin, close to the surface, and then Myka draws back just enough to look at her. Her pupils are wide already.

“Helena...”

And Helena's hands are tracing Myka's face, so close in the dark, and her lips follow the path, dusting along Myka's face, her brow, the slight furrow above it, the part of her hair, her lashes. It is Myka and always Myka, and it takes Helena a moment to realize that Myka is shaking just as much as she is, sinking to her knees in front of her.

Helena bends down, her hair falling over them both like the night. She can hold Myka now. Tonight, no one, not even the King, can take this away from her.

With a quick move of her hand, Helena lets her coat pool on the ground. Claudia will curse later at the grass stains and the dirt that she cannot wash away, but Helena will cherish the reminder.

Under her hands, Myka rises again, her stance firm and lithe, and reaches for her sword belt. For a moment, the weapon sings in the night, then Myka pushes it into the soil already damp with night. And then she is Helena's, and Helena's alone.

Myka's fingers stutter and stumble when they finally find their way around Helena's waist, Helena can feel it, but it does not matter because she is touching her, at last, and now there will be no end to it, not ever. It is not just this touch – the one that has Helena's eyes grow darker – but it is the knowledge of all the touches that will follow.

They fall backwards, the bark of a tree scraping at Helena's back, but all she knows is Myka's hand on her thigh, the grip desperate. It tears something incoherent from Helena’s throat and if it were not for Myka’s hand anchoring her, nothing would stop her from dissolving into the night around them.

But Myka is there, and her hand is trembling, too.

Helena holds onto fistfuls of her hair, leaving her lightheaded with the heat and the breath of her, and with how Helena so easily curves into her every touch. She stumbles under Helena’s kisses and her hands will never again know how to stop. Helena’s belt falls away, one of her sleeves tears, and still her lips leave Myka wanting for more, until her knees buckle and Helena pushes her the rest of the way.

The coat crumples beneath them and Helena is above her. She pulls at Myka’s tunic, at the laces of her doublet, at the bindings of her own corsage. It is two hands at first, then four, and then they tumble into one another, graceless with need.

Myka tries to drape her own coat over them both, but Helena reaches for that hand. She does not need her to be gallant, she only needs _her_.

And Helena’s breaths are galloping ahead of her and she is struggling to catch up, even as she collapses against Myka’s chest, soft breasts unbound and outlined against the haphazardly unlaced tunic.

Tremors ripple through back under Myka’s splayed fingers and then Helena laughs against her neck, softly, and it is just the two of them by the river again.

Helena’s hands are on Myka’s shoulders, muscles beginning to warm from the strain and the closeness, and she pulls off the rumpled tunic at last. Her palm hovers over the old shoulder wound before she traces the scar with her fingers, and then her lips.

Her mouth strays lower, lips dragging across Myka’s skin to finding another scar, and then another. And Myka is the most valiant knight of Cornwall’s crown, but tonight, she is trembling in the arms of the Queen.

Helena has wanted this for so long that she does not remember not wanting it, not needing it like the air she breathes. When she raises her gaze from the plain of skin before her, she finds Myka pushing up into her, eyes wide open, yet unseeing. Even with the night stealing the colors out of the garden around them, those eyes are green, and Helena understands that all the shores she remembers as home have only ever been an echo of this.

Her breath catches along with Myka’s, but her hands are firm, and Myka is taut like a bow, and Helena feels her blood rush close to her skin in wonder.

Honor and name, oaths and the reign briefly shine up in Myka’s mind, shine and perish. She once held them above all else, but now there is Helena above her, and the only thing Myka prays for is for Helena not to take away her hands, to not stop moving.

Helena’s breath is heavy against her ear, and Myka is dimly aware of stars above beyond the rustle of leaves.

“Are you mine?”

Myka barely gets to whisper, “Yes,” before her mouth is taken in another kiss. She thinks she should pray, and instead it is Helena who pleads.

“Stay.”

For a beat, Myka hangs suspended, heaving for breath. “I will always return.”

But Helena must know that she will never be able to walk away from her, no matter where horses or orders take her. Helena’s fingers are strong, her lips a benediction, and when Myka’s voice does not obey her any longer, it is her body who speaks. And Helena must know, must have known all along that Myka is hers, and hers alone, even when Myka is nothing but a blaze of stars racing underneath Helena’s touch.

Yet the way Helena looks at her is shy. And Helena’s smile is so generous, so unguarded, that, suddenly, Myka cannot bear the thought of Arthur seeing her like this.

It is her arms around Helena now, it is her weight that is pushing Helena deeper against the crumpled coat, it is her mouth against Helena’s chest.

And Helena’s hands are on her waist, urging her on. Fingers dig into the muscled small of Myka’s back. Her braid has long come undone and her curls brush against Helena’s skin with every thrust. Her mouth hangs open, air burning in her lungs, honest sweat against the cool night air.

Helena archs up for a moment, hands curved around Myka’s face and her breath hot against Myka’s neck, and then she is tugging her down, a strong grip around Myka’s neck. It is a yoke born gladly and yet Myka will buck against it just the same, just to feel it, and feel it again as Helena’s hold tightens and she flies like the falcons, carried high, and burrows deep into the soil.

When Helena looks at her again, there is tenderness and rapture warring in her gaze and her stomach quivers when Myka rests her temple against it. Even now, Myka’s fingers are unable to still, slowly tracing the slope of Helena’s hip. She has no words, yet she _knows_. And Helena is unlocking her like a key.

The stars continue their path unseen and it is Helena who takes Myka’s hand and kisses her fingers, worn by swords and reins, and who kisses her lips while she holds onto that hand and then pushes Myka’s fingers into herself, deep and without wavering.

And even if Myka were cast into the icy waters north of Thule, she would burn at the sound she swallows from Helena’s lips, and Helena still holds onto her hand, holds on as if she had to die if Myka lessened the pressure even a little.

The soil is lumpy beneath the coat, but Helena does not care. Dew already clings to the grass blades around them and it’s the last thing she knows, and then she is the stars and she is drowning, toes curling and neck arched.

When her mouth finally slackens, Myka is already kissing her. Helena shifts to rest against her and Myka is soft curves and strong hands.

Just as Helena exhales in sheer bliss, Myka stills. And when Helena tips up her head, she can see it too, a first pale stripe fraying out underneath the dying stars. And even the thought of light is enough to make Myka react like the knight she is. It is in her blood.

“We need to part.”

“It is almost dawn.” Helena concedes. “But not yet.” She holds onto Myka when Myka wants to sit up.

“Helena ---”

And Helena wants to bottle the way Myka speaks her name like this, tender and with a bit aggravation, her voice still hoarse with night. She wants to pour it into the most precious flask to be able to tuck it away in the deepest corner of the wooden chest.

“Just once,” she says. “Just once let me fall asleep next to you, and wake with you still by my side. Even if it is just for a minute of rest.”

And Myka looks at the paling sky, and she feels Helena’s hand come to rest over her heart and she cannot deny what she wishes for so fervently herself.

Where does the night end, and where does Helena begin? Are they not one and the same? They are older than this, and yet this is older than they will ever be.

Helena’s breaths come more evenly against her neck and Myka tucks her coat around them both. She allows herself to turn into Helena’s arms and kiss the tousled crown of her hair.

Just one minute, one minute before the light will tear them apart again.

Yells and barking, a tumble steps and dull thudding.

Myka sits up with a start, cold morning air touching her bare shoulders. A shadow of orange red flits by in the dim hour of dawn, perhaps a fox, and then Claudia is running towards them, her face ashen.

“Hurry!”

But this time, she is not quick enough.

The gate is giving way in splintered planks and twisted iron, and torches and voices spill into the garden.

Myka scrambles for her sword, pulling her tunic over her head, but it is too late.

“Cornwall, see your Queen, see you champion knight!”

It is MacMelot, torch in hand, with half the court on his heels, hunters and warriors and the King.

Next to Myka, Helena sits up slowly and wraps the rumpled royal coat around herself.

When Myka, sword held at the ready, glances to the side, she cannot stop herself from reaching out, once more tangling Helena’s fingers with hers. Helena has never been more beautiful than now, solemn and exhausted in the first light of morning. All of Myka is screaming at her to draw Helena into her arms and shield her and to never let go of her again. It is the only thing that makes sense as torches too bright for her eyes cast nervous shadows onto trees and bushes.

But then Arthur steps out from beyond MacMelot’s triumphant stance. He looks old and gray, and it is worse than any anger could be.

“Myka,” he says. He doesn’t say anything else and Myka lets her sword sink.

And even though she knows she should not, even though she knows that she has no right, her eyes are searching for Helena again, who is now standing, wrapped in nothing but the royal coat with her hair fanning out around her face.

Myka closes her eyes and when she opens them again, she forces herself to look at Arthur and even among the overwhelming shame, her lost honor weighs less than Helena’s hand in hers.

At Arthur’s nod, two armed men step forward and Myka is still looking at Helena who glances back at her in dazed warmth as if they were still alone. She doesn’t seem to notice the hands that grab her by her upper arms and drag her backwards to where her husband is standing.

Helena’s bare feet peek out from underneath the coat as she gravitates towards Myka again, her lips still swollen with Myka’s kisses.

And Myka smiles, because this will be the last thing she sees. With a quick flash, she raises the sword to her eyes.

She does not see the lance or MacMelot. She does not see Helena rear up in the grasp of two warriors, struggling frantically. She does not see how the wail of “No!” is torn from Helena’s lips, like a wolf or a bear entrapped, large enough to make the curious courtiers back away.

When the lance pierces Myka’s side, forcing her to the ground, Helena passes out with a scream.

Few are the moments they manage to steal from underneath the mantle of night.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quote translation:
> 
> They could gaze at each other,  
> which was enough to sustain them.  
> The harvest that the eye bore  
> was nourishment for them both.  
> They ate nothing while there  
> but desire and love.


	6. Chapter 6

6

_ir eine und iuwer minne_  
 _ir habet mir mîne sinne_  
 _gâr verkêret unde benomen,_  
 _ich bin ûzer wege komen_  
 _sô starke und alsô sêre:_  
 _in erhol mich niemer mêre._

(Gottfried von Straßburg, _Tristan_ , v. 12017-12022)

 

The stars have died, and dense light of day paints jagged shadows.

It throws Myka’s crumpled form into relief, pinned to the ground by the lance. She breathes with difficulty, but she is still breathing when the King turns his back and walks past her in fury.

She cannot see him. Nor does she see the limp arm falling from between the folds of the dirt-stained royal coat as Helena is carried away.

A raven sails through the pale dawn then, and lands to stand vigil at Myka’s side.

“Let the vultures feast,” MacMelot sneers upon seeing it.

That makes Arthur stop once more, although he does not turn around. “They already have.” And even MacMelot shrinks away from his glare.

The court retreats in hushed whispers. None of them pay attention to the soft-footed brush of red orange along the wall.

“The garden. Hurry.”

It is all that Claudia says to Curvenal, who is still rubbing his eyes in the swordsmen’s barracks and stares at the woman before him with wariness. They both know what she is speaking of and they look at each other in unwanted understanding. He is on his feet before he is fully awake and never questions how Claudia came to bypass the guards.

He stumbles into the garden, belt still untied.

“By the hounds of hell!”

But when Curvenal sees the lance and bare legs and the stark line of red across Myka’s face, he forgets to curse. “What did those bastards...” He rushes closer and at the sound of his steps, Myka blindly tries to move, but to no avail. Her feet are dragging weakly against the soil, as if she were a beetle caught on its back.

Curvenal has seen enough wounds to know that this one is bad, but he will do what he knows to do: He will fight. “You're not dying on my in a garden like some pansy courtier, Myka. If we die, we do it in the field, sword in hand, you hear me?” His hands are unsteady as he feels around the shaft of the lance and then breaks it in two, making Myka moan incoherently. Curvenal winces, but Myka is still breathing and he will cling to that. He bunches up his shirt and presses it over the wound. “Damn witches of Eire!”

He wipes the back of his hand against his eyes before he hefts Myka up against his chest, as gently as he can. He is not sure whether he sees a raven fly up when he carries Myka to safety, through shadowed passageways and abandoned doors.

Behind doors well-guarded, the Queen slowly wakens.

“Myka…”

Next to her, Claudia utters a sound that is half a sob, half a laugh.

“Myka.” Helena moves to sit up. Her skin echoes Myka’s absence, the warmth of her hands, the mindless fear of seeing her torn away and falling. “I have to –“

“The doors are locked, and armed guards outside.” Claudia wipes a tired hand across her face.

But Helena only knows the space between Myka’s body and her own, and that she has to make it go away. “Where did they take her?”

“Nowhere.” Claudia does not meet her eyes.

Helena sways when she understands, bile rising in the throat. “They left her to die?” Her voice is a whisper, and then she is out of the bed in two steps and races towards the doors in deadly rage.

“Helena –“

“Let them run me through as well, then!” Helena hisses, but when she turns to Claudia again, her gaze is broken, anguish etched into her features. “Is she...?”

“I do not know,” Claudia admits. “I sent Curvenal for her.”

“I...” Helena blinks, and all she can see is the lance burrowing into Myka’s side. Decisiveness settles onto her shoulders. “I need to tend to her wounds. I healed her before. She –”

Claudia holds her back when she moves towards the doors again. “If you want to help her, stop saying her name.”

Helena stares at her without understanding and still she sees nothing but Myka tumbling into the lance unseeing and everything about her is screaming. It takes her long moments to take note of her own predicament at last. “Why are we in my rooms?”

“And not in the dungeons or left to die in the garden, as well?” Claudia finishes the thought, and Helena wishes she were in the garden instead, impaled by the same lance that felled Myka.

“You apparently piqued the pride of the Norman envoy,” Claudia states flatly, and Helena does not understand how this can possibly matter, how it even merits to be named. The only thing her mind grasps is Myka, and that Myka is not here with her.

“What with the envoy?” Her mind is numb even as her body is alive, the scent of dewy grass still in her nostrils and her back aching from the stones in the soil.

The memory of Myka’s hands is still so close that it feels like an actual touch, still making her shiver with completion, but the imprints are lessening as the day pushes in and covers them in worry, with clouds hovering low over the ground.

“The envoy did not sign the treaty,” Claudia relates. “Instead, the Normans keep closing in and even made offers to the Eastern duchies. The crown will have to send warriors, and cannot afford war with Eire at the same time. And your mother would declare war if you were harmed.” Claudia nods at the diplomatic impasse. “She would tear Cornwall to the ground herself, in claws and teeth.”

Helena looks up at that with a frown. “But she never changed…”

And Claudia's eyes are older than they both are and Helena wants to have had the strength of bears and wolves to struggle free and throw herself in between Melot and Myka, to have shielded Myka, who could not even see the weapon, not anymore.

And elsewhere, hidden in the stables, Myka’s breath is rattling, but she is still clawing at Curvenal’s shoulder to sit up.

“I am not a coward,” is the one thing she bites out. “Take me to Arthur.”

Curvenal curses, and curses some more, but Myka is his liege, and they are both bound by honor. So he carries Myka of Canoêl in front of Arthur’s throne.

The Queen is not present and by how Myka strains and then stills, she seems to sense it.

“Myka of Canoêl,” Arthur acknowledges her, and the blend of pain and ire in his tone makes Curvenal’s skin crawl and has him wish he were facing a pack of wolves instead. “You have forfeited your title, and you place at court. What for have you come?”

If he is surprised or relieved that she is still alive, Curvenal cannot tell. Myka is too weak to kneel on her own, he is keeping her propped up with his own body.

“To ask for my sentence. My Lord.” Myka’s voice is weak, and Arthur involuntarily leans forward to catch her words. He can see how much strength it takes her just to remain conscious, but he does not offer her to lie down.

“Your sentence.” Arthur repeats quietly. He takes in Myka’s body, not under her command any longer, and the bloodied bandage across her eyes. “Just tell me why you did it.”

For long moments, there is only Myka’s uneven breath audible in the hall. The knights and courtiers around the throne, MacMelot among them, have fallen silent at last.

Then, Myka speaks again. “I cannot say.”

“I would have given you the throne!” Angrily, Arthur throws up his hands. “And gladly! And you betray me like this?”

“It was not her fault,” Myka says, her voice stronger. “I seduced her.”

And still Myka acts like the knights she no longer is, and perhaps it is that display of chivalrousness that angers Arthur the most. “You do not get to talk about her.” Like a knight, Myka has offered up herself in repay for his honor. She has taken the light of her own eyes, without hesitation, and it implies that the most precious thing she had to offer up was being able to see Helena, and it angers Arthur even more. “She is my wife!”

Curvenal sees with alarm that Myka, after a moment, simply smiles at this in a faraway manner. “She is. And she is not.” She has to cough and Curvenal feels her body rattle and go slack again in his hold. “I deeply regret causing hurt to you and the reign. – Hang me like a traitor, if you will.”

There are murmurs among the courtiers, then, but Arthur is still seething at how Myka seems to be beyond his grasp, freer even in her broken state than he, the King, who has lost his Queen and his best knight in one day. “Say that you regret touching her,” he demands.

Myka’s shoulders rise with an attempt at a deeper breath. “I will not lie,” she finally says.

Arthur jabs a bejeweled finger at her, even though she cannot see him. “You pushed me into marrying her!”

“Yes.” Myka acquiesces with a nod. And, even quieter, she adds, “It was the hardest thing I ever did.”

“I should have you killed.” Arthur spits out, even as his eyes burst with sadness when he looks at Myka’s bandages once more. “But I will not. – You are sentenced to the dungeons, to then be exiled in shame to the castle of your father, never to return.”

Myka seems to sag a little more in Curvenal’s arms, but tries to straighten one more time. “And Helena –”

“The Queen is none of your concern,” Arthur says sharply.

But Helena is her only concern.

“Helena…” It is the last word she manages before she passes out, her head lolling back onto Curvenal’s shoulder.

“Pathetic.” MacMelot eyes the battered former champion with derision. “And you really wanted her to be heir to the throne, Cousin?”

“That is enough, James,” Arthur says with authority. He sighs. “I wish I would have never known.”

“They lied!” MacMelot protests. “They betrayed you, and harmed the kingdom. For months, for all we know!”

“And God knows I was happy,” Arthur mutters.

It is evening when he walks past the guards in front of the Queen’s chambers.

“Myka –“ It is the first and only thing Helena says. She searches his face, and he is taken aback by her bravery despite his ire.

“You will not see her again,” he says sternly, but all he achieves is Helena breaking into a small, relieved smile.

“She lives, then.”

Arthur says neither yes nor no. He is left staring at Helena, at the relief that washes over her face and renders her more beautiful than he has ever seen her, and it has nothing to do with him and everything with Myka.

“Why?” he asks again, needing an answer.

But Helena looks at him with that same expression, close to pity, that shone through Myka’s tone in the morning.

“Were you sent here to weaken the reign?” he presses on. “To weaken my standing? To take away my champion knight, my heir?”

“No.” Helena says, and there is something very close to amusement in her voice.

Arthur lashes out in reflex. “I could have you killed for your adultery!”

And in an instant, Helena is in his face, eyes blazing. “Do so, I beg of you.” She inches close to him, closer than she will be in the nightly hours he spends with her. “Do you not think that I wish it was me, and not her, whom you had skewered? – I would gladly take her place!”

Arthur still feels the jealousy tear at him in a way that would be befitting for a far younger man, but he is more surprised to find himself united in his grief for Myka with the very woman who took her away.

“Your reasons, I can see.” He shrugs, looking more an aging man than like a king right then. “My youth has passed. I was a fool to trust my luck, to believe that I found a wife who wanted me, at my age…”

“There are no such reasons.” Helena crosses her arms over her chest and Arthur does not understand that he is not the cause for anything, that none of this has ever been about him. Arthur is nothing but an afterthought, but one has been granted power over their lives. “I seduced her,” Helena makes sure to point out. “Myka did not do anything. That is what you wish to hear, is it not?” Her gaze is unrelenting and now it is Arthur who is at a loss for words. “She cares for you far more than I ever will. And yet you had her run through!”

“You are bound to me,” he reminds her. “Just as Myka is bound to me.”

Helena regards him coolly. “And what about the Lady Vanessa?”

For a moment, it seems as if the King will strike her. Then he steps away, his tone cold. “No harm will befall you for now. Not for your sake, but for the reign’s, for we need the treaty with Eire.” He gestures at the door before the guards open it to grant him passage. “You are confined to these rooms.”

The whole court must know about this because when Helena appears in front of Curvenal in a dark passageway outside the footmen’s quarters, he jumps as if he has seen a ghost.

“You cannot be out here!”

Helena brushes his protest aside. “Let that be none of your concern.”

He takes a step back, wary of her. “Witches,” he spits out at a somewhat safer distance.

Helena gives him an odd look. It takes a moment for the insult to register as such for it is not an insult on the shores from which she hails. But she has not come to fight with him. She may think him rude and unlikable, yet he is the only one whom she trusts with Myka and time is running through their hands all too quickly.

“Take care of her.” It is a simple plea. Helena holds out a purse and two vials. “You will be able to leave. Bring her someplace safe, I beg of you.”

“It is your fault!” Curvenal bites out, his anger catching up with him. He does not even notice that the Queen – the one he always derided for her pride – is pleading with him. “You brought this onto her.”

Helena inclines her head. “Be that as it may. We have no time –“

“Arthur does not want her dead,” Curvenal says defiantly. “He loves her like his own child. Before you came along, everything –“

“James MacMelot wants her dead,” Helena points out quietly, and it stops Curvenal short. There’s something in his gaze that tells Helena that he, as well, is not one to trust the King’s cousin.

“Take her someplace where his men, his family will not find her.” Helena pushes the money and the medicine into Curvenal’s hands. He does not protest. “Please keep her safe.”

“To be safe, she needs to get away from _you_ ,” Curvenal says, only to add, “…my Queen,” as if to make up for his rudeness. Perhaps for the first time, he means it. He may not think her a good fit to the throne, much less for his liege, but even he cannot deny that Helena clearly loves Myka and he can respect that she does not back down, not even in the face of death and the King.

“Yes,” Helena admits with a small nod, and Curvenal can see her pain even in this minuscule gesture. Then Helena’s hands are on his arms, surprisingly strong, and the dark eyes that look at him make it impossible for Curvenal to glance elsewhere. “But I will come for her. I will come for her or die trying.”

Curvenal glances at the hands on his arms and then straightens his shoulders when he meets Helena’s gaze. “I will keep her safe,” he says. “By my sword arm, no one will get to her unless they walk over my dead body.” He does not promise to tell Myka about Helena’s words, but if Helena takes note of that, she does not let it show. It is not as if she has other choices at her disposal.

And this is how Helena finds herself listening from the windows of her rooms the following night, her heart racing after every set of hooves that she hears. She remembers the night the skiff sailed away, soundless on the waters. The rustle of trees carries on the wind and it is the same sound, and the same yearning.

Later, she will hear the yells in the courtyards that Lady Myka is not in the dungeons anymore, and later still, someone will discover that Curvenal is not in the swordsmen’s barracks. But for now, Helena is standing at the window openings, staring out into the night and feeling the space between Myka and herself grow with every breath she takes. It is the only goodbye that she gets.

And then there is just one more thing to do.

Helena cannot heft a jousting lance with enough strength to throw it, but in searching for the ointments to give to Curvenal, another bottle has wandered from the chest into Helena’s sleeve unseen.

MacMelot resides close to the rooms of the King himself. He turns around with a start at the brush of air behind him, only to find the Queen leaning against the door – the only way out, he quickly surmises. Helena’s hands rest against the heavy frame of the door and there is something feral in her gaze that makes MacMelot take a step back.

She eyes him intently, wide sleeves hanging down almost to the ground.

“There is blood between us,” Helena states without preamble. “Myka’s blood.”

“A traitor is none of my concern,” MacMelot brushes her off. “It should not be yours, either.”

“You will never even be a tenth of what Myka is,” Helena declares. It makes MacMelot nervous enough to eye his sword on the table and inch closer to it.

Helena shrugs. “Go ahead, take it.” It will not help him and judging from the look in his eyes, he is aware of it. He reaches for a tray at his side instead and picks up a goblet for a sip of claret wine. The cup is bronze, intricately forged, and when he sets it down again, he smiles at Helena, poised once more. “Well…”

Only when his hands come up to his throat, desperately grasping for air, he realizes that Helena has no need for a sword to avenge Myka of Canoêl.

Helena watches impassively as he crumbles to the floor and then stills, his limbs angled awkwardly. It does not abate her hate but a little. To purge it, she would have to kill him a dozen times, and she wishes she knew how to wield a sword the way Myka does, Myka’s hands that are now too weak to hold even a knife, and whose imprints on Helena’s skin – those that wake her up gasping and flushed at night – are already beginning to fade. And nothing will ever take away the hollowness that settles into place within her instead.

The stars have died, and dense light of day paints jagged shadows.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quote Translation:
> 
> you alone and your love  
> have so possessed all my mind  
> and so distracted all my senses  
> that I have lost my way entirely,  
> and indeed with no prospect  
> that I shall ever find myself.


	7. Chapter 7

7

 

_«mich müejet und mich swaeret,_   
_mir swachet unde unmaeret_   
_allez, daz mîn ouge siht._   
_in al der werlde enist mir niht_   
_in mînem herzen liep wan ir.»_

(Gottfried von Straßburg, _Tristan_ , v. 12023-12027)

 

And high do they cut into the sky, the tall white towers of Canoêl.

They arrive with the first autumn storms and Curvenal curses when his gaze slides up the walls, at the patches of salt and moss dotting the stones, and the grass that nests in crumbled window openings and along broken floors.

Myka still hangs limply in his grasp, her weight slighter than back in Cornwall. The bit of milk and herbed wine that he manages to coax past her lips runs out of the corner of her mouth again without heeding his pleas. And now they do not even have a roof to put above their heads.

“Whatever wild mage your father was, to entice the King's sister to this godforsaken...”

“The river...” Myka, in a bout of wakefulness, smiles. She listens, her brow smooth for a moment. “No, the sea. I remember the sea sounding like this.”

There is not much Myka could remember of the small fief thrust against the waters, far in the Northwest. Even if she could see, her eyes would not recognize much, too young was she brought to be raised at court, her mother lost in childbirth, her father in battle.

Curvenal tenses at the sound of voices and the pattern of animal steps, but inside the old courtyard there is merely a shepherd, ragged in looks, who has sought refuge from the bite of the winds behind a crumbling wall.

And Curvenal curses again.

“By the Wild Hunt, how will we defend ourselves here?”

And he catches himself, knowing that 'we' now means him alone. He eyes the shepherd in distrust and is met in kind. The man has a hand on his knife, weighing the danger that Curvenal means, a trained warrior with strong steps and a sword gleaming at his side, carrying a broken body in his arms.

Curvenal curses some more.

In the end, he finds them shelter from the howl of the storms in one of the towers, half up a set of stairs still solid, and with a view of the cleft hills and the sea to their feet from a wall that still carries their combined weight without trembling.

The vials Helena has given him remain untouched. Sometimes, when Myka's teeth shake in a bout of fever, he takes them out, gingerly, but he always shoves them back into his pocket. He does not trust a witch's work. If not for that damn love potion, they would not be here.

Still, Helena's gold has paid their passage and sealed curious mouths where his fist or his sword could not keep them shut. Whether Helena had anything to do with silent guard or the brittle lock deep down in the dungeons the night they fled, he does not want to be privy to.

There is not much about healing that Curvenal knows other than what he has learned on the fields of battle. He knows of fresh air and clean water and warmth, remedies that heal honest wounds left by swords and lances, both dull and sharp. He does not know what to do with fever that refuses to break, or with flesh that turns yellow and grows purple without cause.

And he does not know what to do with the yearning for Helena that consumes Myka like an invisible wound, even as he tries to fend it off and wash it away with his bare hands.

“Helena...”

It's the same pained plea, time and again. Myka's voice is weak and broken, but it still fits to Helena's name and it sounds as if torn from her flesh in a way that is not human. It spooks Curvenal and makes his skin crawl.

And still the wound will not close, and the fever will not break.

The hold of the nights grows longer and colder. Curvenal can see the shepherds – it is three of them – and their fire at night, where they huddle behind the crumbled wall with their herd. He cannot chase them away, and at least the sheep will give a fair warning in case MacMelot or the King find out where they are and have them chased.

The sea roars beneath the beaten castle and fever rattles Myka like a child's doll the night Curvenal finally gives in. Like this, Myka will not outlive the night, so he pours one of Helena's vials onto Myka's marred flesh and renews the bandages.

The shepherds wordlessly make space for him by their fire when he steps closer. One of them hands him a leather flask with a drink that makes Curvenal grimace and then curse some more. But the fever breaks just before dawn and Myka sleeps quietly for the first time.

After that, Curvenal leaves his sword behind when he joins the shepherds by their fire, in other nights, with Myka asleep.

Myka's hands gain in strength and she forces the second vial out of Curvenal's grasp and onto the festering wound herself when he admits that the Queen gave it to him. He is uncomfortably certain that she would have drunk it down even if it were poison, as long as it was sent by Helena's hand.

The winter storms come and leave salty froth on the walls, white on white. Curvenal covers Myka with sheepskins against the frost and slowly, she is able to hold the cups with mutton broth between her own hands. She does not feel the cold.

In her sleep, there is summer breeze against her skin and it carries Helena's laugh. Her fingers search for Helena's arms among the rough blanket and the night echoes the quiet sigh of Helena settling against her, smile pillowed across Myka's heart, and Myka's sleep is restful.

The gap across her eyes turns from red to white as it scars and she relishes the cold air against her skin when she turns her face towards the sea. Fine mist carries up with the breakwater like the dew by the riverside, a long time ago. She can still see it clearly.

Curvenal scans a horizon devoid of sails. Rarely do ships pass by, rarer still may they search refuge in the battered port of Canoêl. Curvenal has crafted bow and arrows and one night, they share their meal with a small crew of rugged merchants whom Curvenal will only meet with his sword well visible at his side.

But they have traveled along the South, and they have news from the court.

The struggle with the Normans is worsening and it angers Myka because it would have been her fight and her place, at the side of her King.

And the King has celebrated no hunt all autumn long, though no one knows if he cast a plea for an heir with the old Gods, or whether it is a sign of mourning for his cousin, the Duke MacMelot.

Curvenal inhales sharply. “MacMelot is dead? Did he fall against the Normans?”

“Nah.” The smile of the leader of the merchant band is lacking several teeth. “Died like a rat over some food, the same night the knight Lady Myka vanished.”

“Huh,” Curvenal grunts. “Is that so.” He remembers Helena warning him of MacMelot, but then he remembers better, that her warning was only of MacMelot’s men and his family. His respect for the Queen grows another notch, as does his wariness of her.

“How is the Queen?” Myka asks at last, her empty gaze turned towards the flickering flames.

“She doesn't leave the castle.” The merchant shrugs. “Some say the King guards her beauty with jealousy. Some say she's with child.”

Curvenal sees Myka's hands curl into fists, but she does not say more. The lone keen of the shepherds’ pipes carries on the wind and beyond that, there is only the sea.

The rage comes days later, with the merchants long gone, and Curvenal is grateful for the possibility to hunt, or go with his sword after a couple of raiders who were drawn to their fire.

“Far better does she fare without me,” Myka bites out, and Curvenal has lost count of the times she has said this already, as if this will finally be the time where she can say it without bitterness, and with conviction. “She is the Queen, and a heir will leave her close to the throne, will leave Arthur indebted to her.”

The fever returns in an abrupt bout, harsh and brutal, but there are no more vials left and Curvenal listens to Myka's teeth shake as she curses herself.

“And what would she want with a broken woman, no longer a knight, and blind like the old?” And it is a bitterness that will never abate, chafing away at Myka and Curvenal alike. “With no honor to offer, hiding out in a broken castle no longer her own?”

Curvenal hates to see her like this, and he still thinks that it would not have happened if only they had not gone to Eire to woe their proud princess as Queen for Arthur's throne.

“Was it worth it?” he asks one night, sharp and angered, and he hopes that Myka will finally say 'no'.

But Myka calms, her fists uncurling. She still fidgets, but her voice is light and so certain when she says, “Yes.”

And Curvenal curses yet again. To his eyes, even devoid of her title, Myka is still a better knight than most of the others. But Myka rages, promising to set Curvenal free to return to battle and honor, and pleading with him to let her die instead, and to never let Helena know. But even as she speaks the words, Curvenal can hear that she will never stop longing for Helena.

“She said she would come.”

Myka turns her head towards his voice. “What?”

“She said she would come for you.” Curvenal clears his throat. “Come, or die trying.”

“She should not –” Myka tries to say, but she is powerless against the wild hope that suddenly paints itself across her features. When she smiles, it is blinding and Curvenal sees her joy shine brighter than the shepherds’ fire and the winter stars above.

But the next day, her question is plain like that of a child. “But why is she not here yet?”

Curvenal nods at roaring sea to their feet. “You want her out on these waters, in the winter storms?” But he is smiling, for Myka, at last, is sitting up taller. He is glad when Myka cannot see his smile falter. The Queen’s bed is a lot softer than the ruins of Canoêl and it is far away, and no shining knight will ride in to carry her away.

The breakwater licks at the wall when Myka pulls herself up alongside Curvenal.

“It might be better if she does not come,” she says and her tone echoes all of Curvenal’s doubts. “It is enough that she said it.”

“Might be hard to get her away from court,” Curvenal agrees carefully.

“The court!” Myka dismisses it with a shrug. “I gave her my word when we first went to Eire.”

“When we first… Over the tributes?” Curvenal blinks. “But why did we woo her for the King, if you had set your own eyes on her? You insisted –”

Myka draws her lips into a thin line. “She was born to a throne.”

“And you are not of royal blood?” Curvenal scoffs. “You are the King’s niece, and after you defeated Nathaniel, she was nothing but a vassal princess!”

“I never wanted her to feel like a vassal,” Myka says quietly. “I took the crown from her and she healed my wounds, and I swore to restore her honor to her.”

Curvenal exhales as he fits the pieces together. “So you made sure she would have the throne of Cornwall and England instead.”

“Yes.” Myka says and the sad pride of her tone may be all she had left of her honor, but it makes her more of a knight than any warrior Curvenal has ever ridden with.

“That’s got to be the most stubborn, pig-headed –” Curvenal draws a hand across his face, but Myka smiles, softly.

“That is what she said, as well.”

That brings Curvenal up short. “Huh.” He rolls his shoulders. “Seems she’s got some common sense.” He draws his coat tighter around himself. “For a princess, anyway.”

The same night, Curvenal dresses one of the shepherds in their cleanest tunic and best boots, gives him most of what remains of Helena’s gold, and buys him a passage to the South, to deliver a message to the Queen.

Curvenal doubts that Helena will come. And when he looks at Myka, he doubts even more that Helena would stay.

And they wait. Sometimes, in her sleep, Myka utters Helena’s name in a way that makes Curvenal push his fingers into his ears and blush.

Spring comes with renewed winds that tear from all sides at the castle in exuberance. The shepherd does not return. Yet Myka will wait on the wall with a view of the sea, day after day, sunlight and squalls against her brow.

“The ship, do you see a ship?”

Her side still will not heal, leaving her too weak to draw a bow or hold a sword, but not too weak to want and to wait. Fever and want continue to eat away at her like dormant beasts ready to rear their heads at every turn, and Curvenal cannot tell which one is which any longer. If the Queen will come indeed, she better hurry.

In fevered dreams, Myka sees Helena, once more standing above her, aboard another ship, the fateful goblet in her hands. And Helena’s eyes are so dark, and Myka knows that she is drinking to her own death, but she does not care. All she wants is to be able to look at Helena for a little while longer, until her eyes close.

But then Helena drinks to her in return, and her eyes are still so dark, and then all Myka knows are Helena’s lips, time and again.

“A ship, do you see a ship?”

And always Curvenal shakes his head. “No ship, my liege.”

Myka is not asking when the shepherds’ pipes spring up a livelier tune one morning, but before she can move, one of their voices carries up. “A ship, Master Curvenal! Green sails ---“

“Green… green! It has to be her!” Myka tries to pull herself up on the ledge, to command legs that still won’t obey her, and turns her face towards the sea. “Helena… Can you see her, Petrus? Do you see her yet?!”

“I’ll be damned!” Curvenal laughs as the ship draws into the harbor. “It’s the Queen, she’s at the bow. She came!”

Myka sags against the wall behind her, overwhelmed, before she orders Curvenal away. “What are you still standing here? Quick, help her up!”

She cannot see the doubtful glance Curvenal gives her before he hurries down to the port. Once more, Myka tries to upright herself, rising to meet Helena, and she feels stronger than she has in months. Helena has come, and that is all that matters. Not the fevers, not her wound.

She tugs at the bindings and laughs at the sensation of liquid trickling down her side. Nothing can hurt her any longer. “With a bleeding wound, I defeated Nathaniel.” She tries a step forward, one hand still on the wall. “With a bleeding wound, I’ll stand before Helena again!” She takes another step, and her legs hold. Another one, and she smiles in triumph.

Another one, and she hears Helena’s voice, carrying over the wind. “Myka!”

And Myka tumbles forward, managing another two steps before she falls to her knees.

Feet draw nearer, light and quick, closer towards her.

“Myka!”

It sounds like a scream, but Myka is smiling, and then Helena is with her at last, the brush of her dress and the fall of her hair, the warmth of her body and the scent of her skin, the familiar touch of her hands and her lips against Myka’s brow.

“You came,” Myka whispers in wonder. Helena’s breaths are so close to her ear.

“Of course I did.” And Helena’s voice trembles, and so do her lips, and Myka does not understand why as she falls forward into Helena’s arms. Her fingers find Helena’s pulse, her jaw, her temples. And then, at last, there are Helena’s lips against her own and the storm finally halts. Everything halts on this threshold.

She is kissing Helena, and this moment is all the moments there will ever be. Their heartbeats are hanging suspended and it does not matter what will happen in the next breath because there is nothing beyond this.

Myka’s hand curls around a slender neck. “Helena…” She sighs it against Helena’s mouth, blissfully.

Helena is holding her, and she is still holding her when Myka sags in her grasp, her hand falling away from Helena’s neck.

Helena catches it and brings the fingers to her lips, kissing them gently. “Of course I came. My place is with you.” She drops to her knees, Myka’s weight, though so much slighter that she remembers, wearing her down. Still she does not let go off her. “And your place is with me.” Her fingertips follow the welted scar across Myka’s broken eyes.

They have not seen the shock on her face or the hand that flew up to cover her gasp at seeing Myka, face gaunt with yearning and fever, a shadow of the proud knight that Helena remembers. And yet it is Myka, and yet she is hers. She caresses the brow that has grown still, the curls that, for once, are not tucked into a braid.

“You will not leave me, not again.” She cradles Myka to her, on the stones high on the wall. The curve of shoulder under her hands is now more sinewy than broad, but Myka is still her knight. “You get to rest, but just a bit.” Again, she kisses Myka’s lips that cannot respond any longer. “Just a bit.”

The wetness against her belly alerts her and her fingers fly down, pushing Myka’s tunic out of the way and taking in the wound that still has not closed, not even now.

“Poison…” Helena squeezes her eyes shut. “Poison!” It is a whisper, incredulous, and she grasps at Myka’s shoulders, lifting her frame upright against her until Myka’s head lolls softy against Helena’s chest.

“Why did you not send for me sooner?” She smoothes her cheek across the crown of Myka’s hair, like one would do with a child. “I waited. I waited…” There is the rhythm of the waves below, or perhaps it is a willow’s whisper, and Helena gently rocks them back and forth, back and forth.

She does not hear the cries of the shepherds.

“Master Curvenal, another –“

“There are more people, there are warriors –“

“Death and hellhounds!” Curvenal tears his eyes away from the two figures on the wall and reaches for his sword. He already has it unsheathed when he bolts down the stairs, two worn steps at a time, and races towards the broken entryway. “Did the Queen betray us? Did she just lead the King’s men to us?”

He knows the crest on their chests, he knows it well, and he is on them, three at a time, before they can even draw their weapons. “Over my dead body,” he yells. “That is the only way you will get to my liege!”

Even if Myka cannot hear him any longer, even if the King’s men cannot harm her any more, he will stand in between them for as long as he can. His place has always been with Myka, and it is with grim satisfaction that he notes the sharp pierce of a sword high into his leg. Two men lie dead before him already.

But suddenly, in a flash of orange, there is Claudia of Braen, and a cool cloth against his thigh. “We do not come in war.” She does not flinch as he tries to raise his sword again. “The King does not come in –“

“You took my liege, and death is all you will get!” His sword arm does not obey him and Curvenal sees red seeping through his sleeve and now it costs too much strength to do even as much as curse.

“You are not going to die,” Claudia says firmly. “There has been enough death already.”

And helplessly, Curvenal has to watch as King Arthur walks through the fallen gate of Canoêl. He tries to struggle, but Claudia’s hands are enough to hold him down.

“I did not come to shed more blood,” is the first thing the King says and there are two more men with the crest of Cornwall on their shields and armor, but their swords remain undrawn. He looks around himself, and is brought up short by the two figures on the wall. “Dear God…”

“Too late,” Curvenal grunts, and he tastes blood on his tongue.

“I came to see her, to set her free –” And now the King is talking to him, to a simple swordsman because there is no one else left to talk to. “I cannot pardon her officially, but I wanted to send her to exile in peace…” He shakes his head and he looks frailer even than Myka did these past months. “It was a potion. It was not her fault.”

Up on the wall, neither Myka nor Helena can hear him. One of Myka’s arms has slipped from the embrace, her hand motionless on the stones, fingers unfurled as if reaching for Helena even now.

“I even would have let Helena go with her.” Arthur sits on an upended boulder and wipes his hands across his face, royal rings glinting in the light. “Too late, all too late.”

“That love potion brought nothing but death,” Curvenal spits at Claudia.

“That love potion,” Claudia repeats slowly, and Curvenal finds his own anguish mirrored back at him. “It’s what Arthur needed to hear, what Helena believed.” She sets out to bandage his arm and he cowers at the strong scent of herbs from a vial she opens. “It was just claret wine,” she mutters. “I would not serve them the potion of death she wanted, I defied her wishes –“

“Just claret?” For a moment, Curvenal forgets to worry about the liquid Claudia is pouring onto his arm.

“Just claret,” Claudia confirms. She reaches for a strip of cloth to bandage his arm. “Though they believed they would die.”

“Huh.” Curvenal thinks of this past winter, where the only thing gleaming bright was Myka’s longing for Helena.

Claudia’s hands move with ease. “They loved each other long before.”

“They didn’t know?” Curvenal is still puzzled, and Claudia’s eyes are old.

“Would it have changed anything?”

His gaze slides past her, up to the wall, where Myka now lies stretched out on her back, calm as if in sleep. And curled into Myka’s side, head resting above her heart, lies the lifeless form of Helena of Eire. One of her arms is hanging down limply, her fingers just grazing Myka’s.

A sudden gust of wind makes Curvenal shiver and moves the skirts of Claudia’s skirts. On the wall, behind the still bodies, a large raven is unfolding its wings.

It raises its neck in a gleam of blackness and Curvenal shivers again at its braying cry. He watches as it soars up into the sky and circles once above the wall, only to fly out to the sea, high above them all, and then tumbles and crashes into the waves.

And high do they cut into the sky, the tall white towers of Canoêl.

 

_***_   
  
_diu getriuwe cumpanîe_   
_bîhanden sî sich viengen,_   
_ûf den hof sî giengen._

(Gottfried von Straßburg, _Tristan_ , v. 16628-16640)

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quote translations:
> 
> Everything that meets my gaze  
> makes me doubt and tremble,  
> feel weak and as though lost.  
> There's nothing left in the world  
> that my heart loves but you.
> 
>  
> 
> The two close companions  
> took each other by the hand  
> and made their way out of the court.


End file.
